The Heart of the Matter.

March 15, 2009

Romans 10:9-10 that if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved. (NIV)

I was in the post office the other day when I ran into a person I have known for a long time. This person expressed to me their sadness over the Danni’s passing and as we conversed the subject of God came up.

They stated to me that all you have to do is believe in God (to go to heaven) and then added, “Right?” I agreed but since that time I wondered if I shouldn’t have said more. But what is it that I should have said? Belief in Christ and his sacrificial death and resurrection is the heart of the matter.

Maybe I should have made them be more specific by saying…believing in your heart that God raised Jesus from the dead and confessing that Jesus is Lord are the requirements for salvation. We’ve all encountered these moments where we have afterthoughts about what was said.

The bible says in 2 Timothy 4:2 that we should… "Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage-with great patience and careful instruction…”(NIV)

I like what Romans 10:10 says…For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified….so believing comes from the heart not from the intellect or the mind and then out of your heart it causes you to confess with your mouth that “Jesus is Lord”.

But that also brings a change to your heart causing you to repent from your sins and live by another way. If we confess that “Jesus is Lord” then he must truly be Lord! We allow him to rule and reign over every life situation.

As the process continues fruit begins to be evident such as love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23) and Jesus tells us in Matthew 7:20 that we will know what is inside a person by the fruit that is there.

So, is believing in God the only requirement? The demons believe in God but that won’t help them in the end (James 2:19). Believing that Jesus came and died and was raised to life with the heart and confessing Jesus is Lord with the mouth is the way to salvation but it is a process that doesn’t end there.

We must believe and continue to believe with our hearts and that brings change to our lives. Believing sets the wheels in motion bringing us from the wide road to the narrow. (Matthew 7:13-14)

Hopefully, with the help of the God I will be better prepared next time...

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