HEBREWS 10:16-25 – This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my laws on their hearts, and write them on their minds,” then he adds, “I will remember their sins and their lawless deeds no more.” Where there is forgiveness of these, there is no longer any offering for sin. Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful. And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.

THEME OF THE DAY. THE ACTIVE CHRISTIAN LIFE. The Christian life is a doing life. It is an active life. It is an exercising the will by obedience life. Now before we go on, I am not saying, “The Christian life is a doing life in order to gain God’s favor and be saved.” No person is saved by works. The Apostle Paul makes that clear in the second chapter of his letter to the Ephesian believers – For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them (Ephesians 2:8-10). However, the saved person will produce works, that is a doing life to please God. A proper understanding of salvation is because God has shown favor and brought us into His family, we desire to and will obey Him (the doing life) out of love and thankfulness. Be very concerned if this desire and the active Christian life is noticeably absent in our lives. And the primary activity of the Christian is in serving relationships with other Christians. Or we might say, “The primary activity in a Christian is spiritual investments and service to God’s people through life-on-life relationships.”

This is important to grasp. There is no such identity as a Christian who is not serving the people of God. There is never a passive existence in the life of a believer in Christ. Born-again people are not mere church attenders who are moral and read the Bible. Saved people are serving people. Saved people are self-denying people. Saved people are self-sacrificing people. Saved people have been taken over by the Lordship of Jesus Christ leading to lives of placing His will, His mission, and His people’s interests far above their own. It is a clear Biblical contradiction to profess to be a follower of Jesus Christ and not be spiritually active in the body life of a local church and that primarily in spiritually ministering to His people.

In today’s scripture, we are given three “Let us” passages of scripture which point to the active Christian life. The first two point to our individual relationship with the Lord. First, we are exhorted to maintain close fellowship with Him – “Let us draw near” and the second, we are directed to “fight the good fight” by “Letting us hold fast to our confession of faith.” The last “let us” is the fruit of the first two. If we are staying close to the Lord and holding forth our profession, then we will be actively involved in the lives of other Christians. This activity will be in the ministry of exhorting one another to service and encouraging one another in that service. And that brings us to the application . . . are we living the active Christian life as defined by today’s scripture? I hope all of us are striving to do so because the active Christian life is the Biblical Christian life.

PRAYER: “Father, help me to understand my salvation always leads to a life of sacrificial obedience.”

QUOTE: “Christians are serving people; self-denying people; self-sacrificing people flowing from being close to Christ.”