| “Now is our salvation nearer than when we believed” (Romans 13:11). |
| Yesterday we spoke about two ways of being saved — being saved once when we accept the Lord Jesus as our Savior, and being saved continually all through our Christian lives, as the Lord helps us not to allow our old sinful nature to cause us to sin. We did not mention it yesterday, but baptism is how we show this second way of being saved practically in our lives. When we are baptized, we go under the water and then come up again. Going under the water speaks of death, and in this case it is a picture of death to our old sinful nature. We admit that there is no good in it, and all it deserves is death. But then we come out of the water, and this is a picture of resurrection. We now have a new life in Christ, and this new life cannot sin. If we sin, it is always the old nature that does the sinning. God wants us to display that new life in our Christian walk. |
| I have repeated the third verse that we had yesterday, just to remind us of it. How can our salvation be nearer than when we believed? This is the third type of salvation that the Bible speaks about, and it simply means that when the Lord comes, we will have everything that salvation means. Now we already have a new life in Christ, but as we have been pointing out, we still have a sinful nature too. Also, we live in a world that is sinful, and we are constantly being tempted to sin because we see sin all around us. Finally, we still have bodies that get sick, and if the Lord does not come, we eventually die. |
| All this will change when the Lord comes and takes us home to be with Him. Our bodies will change and will become glorified bodies. They will not be subject to disease and death any longer. Also, we will no longer have an old sinful nature. It will never tempt us to sin anymore. Finally, we will be taken out of this world, to a place where sin can never come. No longer will we see sin around us. In this way, we will realize the full effect of our salvation, for we will never see or commit sin again. This is the salvation about which the Apostle Paul is speaking, when he says that our salvation is nearer than when we believed. As time goes on, we get closer and closer to the Lord’s coming. Today we are very close to His coming; it is very near! |
