Have you ever watched a war movie? Have you noticed it seems all the characters in the movie are heroes? They run toward the fighting. The jump on the grenade to save their buddies. They run straight to the machinegun nest to take it out to save their platoon. Do you believe that is real life?
In rare cases these types of events do happen. They are rare, perhaps very rare. Most servicemen-women do not want to die. They don’t want to be injured. They don’t arbitrarily want to be in combat. Now, give them a mission and they are all in.
We have heard of shootings taking place in churches by deranged, hateful people. Even in these cases, it is very rare that someone will put themselves in front of the gunman to save another. We might think Christians, who know they have eternity with God, would be willing to die to go there now. Yet, that isn’t typically the case.
We see the Apostle Paul telling the church in Rome these same truths in today’s passage. The good person he states someone might die for is the soldier that stands next to you. It’s the brother or sister in arms who is good, but not righteous. It is the child the mother or father will shield with their own body.
Paul goes on to state that God demonstrated His love for us when Christ died for us when we least deserved it. He died for us when we were running away from Him. He died for us while we disobeyed Him—stealing, murdering, slandering, gossiping, cavorting, drunkenness, cursing, etc., etc., etc. We know what we’ve done. We know how we have disobeyed, not just once but many, many times.
The good news in all of this is God loves us enough to cover us in His grace and mercy. He is willing to forgive us. We can shed our shame by accepting these blessings from God. We can live free of guilt. Doesn’t that take a huge load off your shoulders? Yet, it doesn’t mean we are to continue in our sinning. As Paul states in Romans 6:1-4, though we are to accept God’s grace, we are not to continue sinning, testing God’s patience.
I pray we all realize that Jesus came to die for us. I pray we all accept God’s blessings of grace, mercy, and forgiveness. I pray each one of us will ask God to steer us away from our past sins and into a life of following Jesus. Know that Jesus died for you. Accept God’s blessings. Go forth and sin no more. Praise God for His blessings.
Romans 5:7-8 Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us
Marty Pressey 