Devotions: Faith in Body and Soul

 

But what does it say? “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart”—that is, the word of faith which we are preaching, that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation.

Romans 10:8-10 New American Standard Bible (NASB)

 

In this chapter Paul is talking about his fellow Jews who rejected Jesus’ sacrifice which gives believers His righteousness. Instead, they chose to attain righteousness through the Law. This required animal sacrifices and a perfect life. Yet animals are not capable of saving anyone, and no person (aside from Christ) can perfectly obey the Law. They wanted to justify themselves, to earn it on their own. Paul preached a righteousness based on faith in Jesus. This faith encompasses the whole person, body and soul. For it is with our souls that we believe in what Jesus has done; that He is God and Lord who came as a man, lived and died for our sins, and was raised back to life eternally. It is with our bodies that we confess what we believe. We tell others what we believe with our mouths, but we also show them our faith by our actions. That belief of spirit and action of body combine in true faith yielding salvation and righteousness. We cannot have one without the other, just as we cannot have salvation without righteousness and vice versus. If we confess with our mouths what we do not truly believe, we are hypocrites and liars and our actions will eventually show us out. But if we believe without confessing or acting on our beliefs, our faith is halfhearted and in vain and not real. We must have both. Faith without works is dead for God made us to do His good works. If we do not follow Him in what He made us to do then we are not living in faith and it is proof that our faith is not real for it yielded no transformation of righteousness.

How is your faith? Do you live out what you believe in your heart and soul? Have you made Jesus Lord of your life? Ask God to make your faith real to you, to give you the desire and ability to live out your faith and His will and calling for your life and to submit to Him as Lord.

 

 

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