Category Salvation

Jun 26 2007

The Exclusivisity of Jesus for Salvation


 “If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater; for this is the witness of God which He has testified of His Son. He who believes in the Son of God has the witness in himself; he who does not believe God has made Him a liar, because he has not believed the testimony that God has given of His Son. And this is the testimony: that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son.

He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life. These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life, and that you may continue to believe in the name of the Son of God.” (1 John 5:9-13 NKJV)

John’s record sounds very much like Jesus’ own words when He said, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God.” (John 3:16-21 NKJV)

The truth is clear. Men are given eternal life based wholly upon what they have done about Jesus. And, the text is also very clear that those who refuse to take God at His word do so because they love their sin, or to put it another way, they refuse to repent. Those who go to the light, simply believing what God has said about Jesus, have eternal life and will not ever be condemned again.

Salvation is not found in living right, in any church on earth, in aligning with a religeous system, or any other way than by taking God at His word and trusting Jesus and Him only. Those who try to get into the kingdom any other way are rejected and will not be saved in the end unless they repent and come to Christ.

Who can God save? Whosoever will let him come.  Does God need my assistance to save? No. Can God extend His love and forgiveness to anyone on the planet at any time He chooses? Yes.

“When we all get to heaven we will sing and shout the victory”. And, every last one there will be saved by the person and work of Jesus and not by our own doing. “There is no other name given among men whereby we must be saved”. Simply put, it is Christ or condemnation. Have you believed God’s record or have you believed the “witness of men”? Trust Christ today.

Grace to you,
Royce Ogle

Jun 6 2007

Bayou La Batre update…


Last Friday Carol and I drove to Bayou La , Alabama to spend the weekend with the believers there and the volunteers who were there to help. It was a blessed weekend of new beginnings.

First, the little congregation met for the first time for services in their soon to be “own” building. Members of the El Campo Church of Christ from El Campo, Texas came to spend a week working in the relief effort and part of that work was to hang dry wall, tape and bed, and expand the kitchen in the fellowship hall. They did marvelous work and we gladly met together in the fellowship hall to worship and enjoy fellowship. The El Campo gang are wonderful people who love Jesus and others with all their hearts. I know that my friend John McCord, the preacher there, is very proud and thankful for such wonderful folks.

People from Hill Top Rescue and Relief and Servants Unite were also in attendence as well. One of our co-ministers at Whites Ferry Road Church in West Monroe, Bro’ Alan Robertson, preached a great message of encouragement. He and his wife Lisa enjoyed meeting the people Carol and I have loved for so long.

At the invitation, a young girl responded, requesting to be baptised. It was my joy to baptise her in the Gulf after the service. Then on Monday, after we were back in Monroe, we received the glad news that two of the girl’s cousins were baptised as well. I had shared the good news with these three young ladies on Saturday and I am delighted to have these children in the faith.

The name of the Bayou La Batre church will soon be changed to Hemley Road Church of Christ. The most obvious reason is the new location and building which is on Hemley Road in Bayou La Batre. Then, there is the chance for a new beginning, leaving the past in the past with all its problems, and looking to the future.

The revovery work of Bayou Recovery Project and of the infant congregation is making great strides. Friends, mostly believers, though some are not, have given and worked very hard to make things better for the people of the Bayou area. What a wonderful opportunity to share Christ when “not-yet-believers” come to help work on houses along side Christians.

Perhaps another $50,000 is urgently needed to complete the purchase of the building and to do the minimum repair work to make it functional. If your congregation has not been involved in missions recently, or if you want to increase your missions effort, there is no more worthwhile place you can put the Lord’s money.

Satan has fought on every front from without and within but Christ is daily giving victory after victory for which we are humbled and thankful. There are some whose only motive appears to be to preserve tradition without regard for others who get damaged in their wake. God will sort them out. We keep sowing the good seed of the good news about Jesus, actively loving the people right where they are in the physical and spiritual debris of live, and God continues to bless beyond our expectations and dreams.

In the small corner of the kingdom of God where we live and work, Carol and I want to make much of Christ and his love for sinners. We have no agenda other than His agenda, to seek and save that which was lost and to bind up the broken hearted along the way with hugs, smiles, encouragement, and hope for today and forever.

When you go to your secret place to talk to God, please mention us to Him and the work we love so much. When the sun sets on our last day on earth my earnest hope is that we have made a difference for time, and for eternity.

Grace to you,
Royce Ogle

May 25 2007

Give me that old time religion…..?


“It was good enough for my mother and its good enough for me, give me that old time religion, give me that old time religion.” My earliest memories of church include hearing that song at home prayer meetings, little country churches, and the front porches of rough wooden houses in the Blue Ridge hills of North Carolina.

 But do we really want that “Old time religion”?

 I fear that most of what was experienced then, and much of what is experienced now, is just that, “religion”. In my view religion is a series of attempts to find favor with God. In other words, it is trying to do some act, or several acts with a view of getting God to like us, or perhaps to even love us. The opposite of religion is Christianity which  is God’s perfect work of setting undeserving trangressors right with Himself and entering into a loving relationship with them through Christ and wholly upon Christ’s merit.

 Are you religious or are you in a loving relationship with God through Jesus? What is passed off as Christianity in many places is nothing more or less than “that old time religion”. What motivates your Sunday morning attendence at church  services? Duty or love? If you attend and sing 3 to 5 songs, give some money, listen to 2 or 3 prayers, participate in the  Lord’s Supper, and listen to the preacher, have you really worshipped? Is that what worship is about, doing things? I will  readily admit that all of these 5 things can be worshipful, but the simple doing of them is not necessarily worship.

 You  see, a lost person can do those things quite well, and even more according to Jesus’ own words. (Matthew 7:21-23) Jesus made it quite clear that not everyone who says he or she is a Christian really is. (Matthew 7:21)

 Paul’s letter to the church at Rome made it clear that worship is much more than tagging the bases on Sunday. He characterized worshippers as “living sacrifices” whose lives are marked with holy living. This he says is “reasonable” acts of service, or a better translation is “spiritual service of worship”. (Romans 12:1,2) Worship is spiritual according to Jesus. (John 4:21-24) He said God “is seeking” people to worship Him who will worship in “spirit” and in “truth”. 

We flesh bound humans tend to go to one extreme or the other. We either lean heavily on the “spirit” part of the equation, resulting in many of the problems Paul addressed in the Corinthian church related to giftedness and the use of spiritual gifts, or we put far to much emphasis on “truth” at the expense of “Spirit” and go through the motions “having
 a form of Godliness but denying His power”. (2 Timothy 3:5) The context Paul was addressing to young Timothy was false teachers but the principal applies to all of us. Jesus made it clear when He spoke of those who honor Him with their lips but whose hearts are far from Him. (Matthew 15:8; Mark 7:6) I ask this, are the people who only go through  the motions on Sunday morning with hearts far from God in any better standing with God than the ones who are moral, don’t use bad language, raise good kids, and do good works through a civic club like the Lions Club or some other?

 It is clear that many do think so, and not only do they believe they are right, but also believe they are far superior to everyone else, even other “Christians”. Now, let me quickly add that I can’t see a persons heart as Christ can. But an honest, casual observer can spot a sham with little effort.

 Christ died in your place and mine, not to make actors but to give everlasting life to spiritually dead sinners whose lives were an offence to a Holy God. He did not come to offer a new start but rather a new heart.

How sad to be religious but lost. Jesus gave a parable about a sheepfold and the way in by “The good Shepherd” (John 10:1-16) Those who try to enter by their own faithfulness, their own “doing”, will be lost. Jesus said “I am the way, the truth, and the life, and no man comes to the Father but by me”. (John 14:6).

 All of the religion of a thousand worlds, the good deeds of every person, and the faithfulness of the best of human history can not give life to the dead. (Ephesians 2:1-4)

 “Give me that old time religion”? No, give me Jesus!

Grace to you,
Royce
 

May 6 2007

Are you sure you are saved?


Do you know beyond any doubt that you are going to heaven? Are you sure you are saved? If so, why?

Is it because you live a good life? Is it because you are a member of the true church? Is it because you have been baptised?

Perhaps we should ask, “Can we know for sure we are saved?” If so, how can we know it?