I am glad I am not saying this out loud, but I have to say that I love the Bible “buts.” Just imagine what it would be like without the occurrences of that little word. We will leave those and deal with them as they appear, but the one that appears in Romans 6v23 is one that changes everything.
“The wages of sin is death….” We have already been shown adequately that there is no one who lives without sin. “All have sinned and come short of the glory of God,” combined with “the wages of sin is death” would leave us pretty hopeless and helpless. In that state or eternal fate would be a death worse than death.
However, there is a “but” here. “But the gift of God…” Not the penance of God, not the wages of working for God, but the gift of God is eternal life. We give gifts, or at least we should, without any expectation of repayment or reward. The only condition on a gift is receiving it. Christmas is a fortnight away. Can you imagine saying – “Here is your present, but to get it you have to do so and so”? No a true gift is just that, a gift.
What is this gift? Eternal life. Wow! Amazing! Astounding! Incredible! Incomprehensible! But there it – God’s gift.
Praise God for this particular “but” of the Bible!
No comments:
Post a Comment