Loved Ones
“As he says in Hosea: ‘I will call them “my people” who are not my people; and I will call her “my loved one” who is not my loved one,’ and, ‘In the very place where it was said to them, “You are not my people,” there they will be called “children of the living God.”’”
Today’s Text: Romans 9:25-33 (Living Life Daily Devotional)
I think every single person in Canvas (and GCC, for that matter) falls into this category. I have met some messianic Jews. They are practicing Jews who believe in the gospel of Jesus Christ. The apostle Paul himself would be called a messianic Jew today. Among Christians, messianic Jews are a very small minority.
The fact that messianic Jews continue to practice their Jewish traditions does not necessarily disqualify them from salvation. What disqualifies any person from salvation is the absence of faith in Jesus Christ, and that is all.
If any person believes that salvation depends on faith in Jesus plus anything else, that belief contradicts the Bible with respect to the sole sufficiency of faith in Christ for our salvation. We would have to say that those people are not saved, based on the sole authority of Scripture as the word of the Living God.
However, who can really know the mind of God in such matters. I hope that I am wrong about that specifically when it comes to our Catholic friends.
We would think that people who add to faith in Christ as a condition of salvation are very close to saving faith, but they might be further away from saving faith than even a complete non-believer.
Religious traditions have a way of becoming very stubborn idols in our hearts. Those religious traditions obstruct salvation when they are thought or felt to be necessary for salvation—in addition to or apart from our salvation through faith in Jesus Christ.
Of course, even evangelical Christians have a way of making religious traditions idolatrous. We may not think of our traditions as “necessary for salvation,” but in our hearts they may be “non-negotiable” with respect to the practice of our faith and worship. When that happens, those religious traditions can do more harm than good, especially in terms of our witness.
Religious traditions are tools for the pursuit of our spiritual expression and spiritual experience. But spiritual expression and spiritual experience are never the goals of our faith. The goal of our faith is faithfulness and obedience.
A step of faith is always a step of obedience, and a step of obedience is always a step of faith.
Anyway, I’m not sure how I got there, but I was really thinking about my family in Korea—some in Seoul, one in Pusan, some in Jeju. Most of them do not believe. They are “not God’s people.” But God’s desire is to call them “my people” and “children of the living God.”
I recognize (again) that I should not waste any opportunity with them. They do not speak English. I do not speak Korean. But there is a common “language” in our blood that God can use, I think … I believe.
Father, Your prophecy through the prophet Hosea and others has reached me and engulfed me into Your salvation. I am not counted among Your people as a child of the living God. May Your Spirit empower me to share Your good news to others who are not Your people so that they may be Your people too, even my family. In Jesus’s name. Amen.
