A little more than "fire insurance"

Have you ever heard someone say of someone's 'salvation experience' that they just 'bought themselves a little fire insurance'? It is as though they are pointing out the individual has said 'yes' to Jesus, but only as a means to not go to hell. Is it possible to get 'fire insurance' and still live a life as we choose? It also begs to question if the "once saved, always saved" term is biblical - based on what we can find in scripture and recognize to be true about the nature and character of God. I know parties that will weigh-in on both sides of this equation, but we need to understand some scriptures that might help to answer those questions - or at least, provide the biblical perspective "in context" rather than taking a few verses out of context that might support one opinion or another. "Fire insurance" and "once saved, always saved" are just two 'states' of our soul we have labeled - you won't find these terms in scripture, so you have to be vigilant to glean what you can from what is there!

"This is how much God loved the world: He gave his Son, his one and only Son. And this is why: so that no one need be destroyed; by believing in him, anyone can have a whole and lasting life. God didn't go to all the trouble of sending his Son merely to point an accusing finger, telling the world how bad it was. He came to help, to put the world right again. Anyone who trusts in him is acquitted; anyone who refuses to trust him has long since been under the death sentence without knowing it. And why? Because of that person's failure to believe in the one-of-a-kind Son of God when introduced to him." (John 3:16-18)

Salvation is a term used in Christian churches to describe the condition of having surrendered your body, soul, and spirit to the Lord Jesus Christ. It is more than asking Jesus "into your heart", as some put it. It is a condition of "exchange" - we exchange our filthy, unholy condition for the holy and whole condition of God's Son, Jesus. This exchange is something that is a result of believing in the work of Christ on Calvary in dying for the sins of mankind. It comes by faith - there is absolutely no amount of "doing" that makes us "saved". It is more than 'fire insurance' to keep us from burning in hell. What really happens at the point of "salvation" is that we are delivered from the potential of eternal death. There is a lengthy passage in Matthew 25 that speaks of weeping, gnashing of teeth, being cursed, everlasting punishment, and eternal life. One is the condition of eternal death - the other is eternal life. There is a very real separation from God that is eternal and there is only ONE way to ensure that we escape that eternal separation - Christ. If you want to call this 'fire insurance', be my guest, but there is much more to it than ensuring we don't 'burn in hell' for our sins!

Sin is really a condition of heart that means that we have gone beyond the boundaries God has set for our lives. Sin is more than a "passing thing" in our lives. It is a series of behavior problems that stem from wrong attitudes, impure motives, selfish actions, and just plain wrong patterns of conduct. By nature, we are pretty self-centered individuals - always on the lookout for how a circumstance will affect us, not so much the 'other guy'. We are born with this nature. If you don't believe me, look at a newborn. They pop out hungry, expecting to be fed. They soil their diapers, expecting to be removed from what makes them uncomfortable. They miss the warmth of the womb, so they cry until they are rocked into slumber. These are traits that indicate we have needs and we demand them to be met - don't meet those needs timely and the infant makes life miserable for everyone! Behavior may be a learned thing, but our sin nature is something that we are indeed born possessing. Our tendency to sin is therefore not a LEARNED thing, but a product of the nature we were born with. If you don't believe me, try changing a particular behavior all on your own. You may change that behavior, but underneath the very nature that encouraged that behavior is still there - that is why we struggle with change so very much.

Many people feel they can just deal with their own sin - like willpower is enough to change behavior in a lasting and meaningful way! Willpower is the desire and ability to resist something, but it is a self-motivated action and can be very 'short-lived'. It is important to realize that we cannot transform our spirit without also having our "nature" touched by the hand of God. We need that nature to be altered by the altar! We cannot alter it by merely 'determining' to be 'good'. "Christ arrives right on time to make this happen. He didn't, and doesn't, wait for us to get ready. He presented himself for this sacrificial death when we were far too weak and rebellious to do anything to get ourselves ready. And even if we hadn't been so weak, we wouldn't have known what to do anyway. We can understand someone dying for a person worth dying for, and we can understand how someone good and noble could inspire us to selfless sacrifice. But God put his love on the line for us by offering his Son in sacrificial death while we were of no use whatever to him." (Romans 5:6-7)

We probably have a little problem associating with this passage because we don't really understand this kind of sacrificial love and commitment as we don't 'sacrifice' on alters anymore in our culture. An alter sacrifice was 'procured' and 'prepared' in order to make it to the altar. It was a lamb without a blemish, a sheave of the harvest taken from the first of the thrashing.  We have absolutely no ability on our own to "procure" our salvation. There is nothing in man that could make right what sin had made so wrong. God being the loving God he is by nature made that provision for our sin - he provided the exchange of nature we so desperately need, but could never produce by any effort of self-determination or willpower on our own. Romans goes on to say that God has a holy nature and his holy nature cannot coexist with the sin nature of man - in order to come together, the nature had to be "fixed". Reconciliation with God requires a change of nature. Man must act on what has been provided in order to enjoy the provision. In other words, we must desire the exchange of our nature, calling upon the sacrificial work of Christ to make us holy - not just to give us 'fire insurance', but to work upon our lives to 'insure' we are transformed. God made provision for the exchange of our nature - that provision is Christ. All we "do" is accept the work of the cross, believing that Jesus is the only provision for our sin problem. It is through Christ that we exchange natures - no other way works! Just sayin!

You ready?

As another wave of storms swept through the valley over the past three days, they came with quite strong winds and what some call "micro-bursts" of storm activity.  These micro-bursts have the capacity to dump a lot of rain at once in seemingly one spot, combined with high winds which do significant damage.  Block walls were leveled, power poles snapped in two, and trees uprooted.  It seems like the storms lately have become more and more "aggressive", taking their toll on the neighborhoods where they hit the most.  It also seems like there are areas of our large metropolis where these storms hit with such frequency that people are constantly "bouncing back" from them.  Some areas were hit with nearly three-quarters of an inch of rain, while others enjoyed a steady rain most would consider nothing more than sprinkles.  Close to 30,000 customers were without electrical power for over one day.  At first this doesn't seem to significant in the face of things like Hurricane Katrina or the raving effect of tornadoes in the Midwest, but Arizonans just don't expect the "worst". They don't plan for it, nor do many of them actually know what to do when the "worst" actually does come.  I guess we all have a tendency to live life like this on occasion - not really believing the "worst" may happen, so failing to be in a place of readiness should it happen.

Those who obey the Lord are daily in his care, and what he has given them will be theirs forever.  They won’t be in trouble when times are bad, and they will have plenty when food is scarce.  (Psalm 37:18-19 CEV)

There is a way to live life prepared for any and all inevitabilities - those we see and don't see coming.  The weather forecasters predicted three days of rain - some heavy and some just enough to wet the parched earth.  They revealed the storms left great flooding and mudslides in their path as they made their way through neighboring cities in a neighboring state, but did their predictions change the response of those in their path?  If you looked at those who were affected by the storms in the metropolis in which I live, I'd have to say "no". The way they were living just before the storms began to hit didn't really change - there was no sense of preparation or even any belief they'd need to prepare.  This is how it is with many people in this day and age - living as though preparation was not necessary - in a physical, financial, and spiritual sense!

That place of preparation is found not in a "place" as much as in a "person" - Christ.  As my pastor puts it, we learn to live "prepared" lives when we place our faith, hope, and trust solidly in Christ and nothing else.  Those who obey the Lord are daily in his care...  This says it all - there is no better place of "preparedness" than to be daily in the care of Jesus.  It doesn't mean we don't save our finances so we are prepared when a need hits us such as an unexpected medical bill or car repair.  It also doesn't mean we don't "do" anything with the knowledge we possess about the grace and love of God.  We are called to live prepared lives and that means we make Christ central in our physical, financial, relational, and spiritual lives.  In all areas, he is central.  In all areas, we then stand prepared.

What does "fire insurance" do for us?  It helps us rebuild our houses if there is a disaster which results in fire damage to our homes, right?  It is there for the "what if" of life.  In most cases, people just rest a little easier because they have it, not ever expecting to actually use it. The same might be said of "flood insurance" and "life insurance".  We don't expect to use it, but we have it for the "just in case" type of occurrence.  With the exception of life coming to an end for all of us, most of our other types of insurance are not typically collected upon - we pay the premiums faithfully and then we never make a claim.  We did get peace of mind by having them for the "just in case", but we never really actually needed them.

I wonder how many people go through life treating their relationship with Jesus as though it were "fire insurance" - there to keep us out of hell, but not really laying "claim" to all this relationship means.  My father was a life insurance agent with a large insurance firm for years.  He was a certified life underwriter - he wrote policies designed to insure lives.  Those policies didn't change the outcome of death to those who bought them - they just made it a little easier for those left behind to go on without that person in their lives.  They provided some financial benefit to the survivors.  The life insurance didn't benefit the one whose life was covered, but those who would come after them.

I wonder if this is how Jesus expects us to treat the "life insurance" his grace provides in our lives - by helping others who come after us to meet, know, and follow him.  Grace isn't an "insurance policy" - it is a means by which we live our lives to the fullest and then pass that blessing onto others.  Yes, grace provides a means by which we escape the separation from God which sin ultimately maintains.  Yes, grace provides us with access to the many blessings of God.  Yes, grace is a kind of "insurance" against our continued separation from God - because it not only covered our past sins, but those we commit today and into the future.  But...grace isn't just "insurance" - it is a means to live our lives to the fullest, prepared to face each challenge, and igniting a passion within us which in turn helps ignite the spark of faith in others which will ignite their own passion for serving Jesus.

We don't prepare for the inevitabilities in life through "buying insurance" - we prepare for them by actually "preparing".  In other words, we buy the flashlights, batteries, and generator to prepare for times when electrical power may not be available.  We aren't doomsday prep kind of people, but we live prepared lives.  This carries from our physical lives into every realm of our walk - finances, relationships, and even into our spiritual lives. We need to learn to live prepared!  Just sayin!