“God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can’t take credit for this; it is a gift from God. Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it. For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.” Ephesians 2:8-10
So Paul arrives at His point here in chapter 2: you were saved from death, sin and hell, but it wasn’t because of your own doing! It was because of God’s good favor or GRACE! There is nothing about our salvation that we can take credit for! We couldn’t be good enough to earn salvation because even just one little sin would have disqualified us! We could never be rich enough to buy it because it cost the life-blood of a Perfect Person and ONLY Jesus met this standard. Romans 3:23 says “ALL of us have fallen short of God’s glorious standard.” Meeting God’s standard by being perfect would be like trying to shoot a basketball to the moon – even the best shooter’s ball would fall short due to gravity. Sin, like gravity, pulls down our best attempts at perfection! Salvation comes by grace alone- it is God’s gift!
Paul then makes it clear that since, “salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done … none of us can boast about it!”
Furthermore, though salvation cannot be earned BY good works, that we are God’s masterpiece, created IN Him FOR good works! Good works, in the life of a Christ follower are a RESULT or BY-PRODUCT of salvation, not the PRICE to obtain it! Our works result because of our love for Jesus, not as an attempt to earn His love! No, HIS LOVE IS FREELY GIVEN, PAID IN FULL BY HIS PERFECT SACRIFICE, HIMSELF! There’s nothing for us to boast about except HIM!
Paul finishes this thought by reminding us that all of this grace, salvation and even good works, were planned for long ago by God. God created us, knowing that we would sin and reject Him and Jesus would have have to be sacrificed to pay for our sins and He created us anyway! That’s how long ago He planned for our salvation! That’s how much He loves us!
Today, consider how unearnable salvation is and receive salvation as a GIFT from a GRACEFUL GOD WHO LOVES TO GIVE!
Think about it!
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