Not Our Own Saviors

[Sara V Schmidt]

A letter from early January 2014:

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Chosen
From: G...
To: ask@thepathoftruth.com
Date: 1/5/2014 6:35 PM

I have been struggling with whether or not I am truly saved. I have said the sinners prayer so many times and I was, I'm embarrassed to admit, baptized 5 times. I struggle with sin in my thoughts and selfish desires and I'm afraid that because I struggle with that everyday I'm not truly a transformed child of God. Then today my pastor said that not everyone is chosen as a child of God. Could it be because I continue in my sin that I was created to "not be one of God's chosen"?

Victor responded:

“G...,” you aren’t saved. If you were, you’d know it and there would be no need for formulas. You’d be rejoicing like Zacchaeus (Luke 19). The Lord would be alive to you.

That’s not to say that you wouldn’t have thoughts of sin or selfish desires that needed dealing with if you were saved. How else could Paul say, after receiving the Spirit?:

Romans 7:18-25 LITV
(18) For I know that in me, that is in my flesh, dwells no good. For to will is present to me, but to work out the good I do not find.
(19) For what good I desire, I do not do. But the evil I do not desire, this I do.
(20) But if I do what I do not desire, it is no longer I working it out, but the sin dwelling in me.
(21) I find then the law, when I desire to do the right, that evil is present with me.
(22) For I delight in the Law of God according to the inward man;
(23) but I see another law in my members having warred against the law of my mind, and taking me captive by the law of sin being in my members.
(24) O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?
(25) I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then I myself with the mind truly serve the Law of God, and with the flesh the law of sin.

Not that the saved choose deliberately to sin, but we do battle with the prince of this world and with unbelief.

You needn’t be concerned about being one of God’s chosen. He chooses whom He wills, some as vessels of mercy and others as vessels of wrath. If He should choose you as a vessel of dishonor, what can you do about it, besides not a thing?

However, I’d say that if you’re looking to do right, to honor God as He would have you honor Him, then He is calling you to Himself. Repentance from sin and seeking the Lord’s will never originates in man. Your sin is trusting yourself to be acceptable. No man is acceptable to Him. That’s why we need Him as our Savior from start to finish.

“For by grace you are saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to good works, which God has before ordained that we should walk in them” (Ephesians 2:8-10 MKJV).

You’ve had your struggles, but that’s because you’ve been trusting in yourself to be right instead of having faith in Him and committing yourself to His hands. It can’t happen any other way. You aren’t your own savior and the only righteousness of value is His:

“But we are all as the unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as a menstruation cloth. And we all fade as a leaf, and like the wind our iniquities take us away” (Isaiah 64:6 LITV).

You can’t ever be in peace with your efforts, but you can have the peace that passes understanding by saying, “Lord, I commit myself into Your hands to do with me as You see fit, whatever that might be, good or bad. I accept Your judgment.”

Read much at our site. Truth makes you free.

Victor
www.ThePathofTruth.com

[William Woeger]

Can I extend from this?

You say, "What matters is His righteousness."

"His righteousness" That means His work is what matters. What He wants only counts.

Not our works. Not our way. Not our righteousness, for we have none. Would be delusion to think so.

I can't recall if there is a Scripture, but, the Lord takes men to do His work.

So how do we do His righteousness? His work?

Obedience. To the cross obedience.

[Darrell Kane]

Amen! I am guilty of trying to be my own savior. I feel bad when I think I have sinned. I then try to get back in good favor with God by being religious. I fear man so much.I have tried to will these fears away or do something to prove to myself I don't fear man. Lord you are my Savior I will trust You. I pray that You keep me from evil.I give up my filthy works no matter how good I think they are.I am so evil in my thoughts. Lord Jesus Christ I need you.