The danger of taking lightly the call to holiness

Paul tells us that as a consequence of the greatness of God's plan we must live up to it and we are going to see why Paul says that we present our bodies as a living sacrifice, holy, pleasing to God and what that means for the Christian life .

But do you remember that the last time I said about this idea that Paul said in another passage of Scripture that how can we receive mercy from God if we neglect a plan of salvation as great as the one that God has devised?

And I want to strengthen that idea by going to the Epistle to the Hebrews that many commentators think was written by the apostle Paul although we are not sure who it was who wrote this Epistle in the end but here it says in chapter 2 of Hebrews the writer says, chapter 2 Verse 1: "Therefore we must more diligently attend to the things we have heard, lest we slip away."

The writer is suggesting that: hey as a consequence of, in this case in chapter 1 he speaks of the greatness of the Son and of His sublimity, it is necessary that with great diligence and with great care. Note that the call to holy life, the call to a God-pleasing behavior is not a casual, optional behavior that the Word offers us, but is something tremendously serious and to a certain extent solemn, it is a very emphatic call.

Holiness is not an option for God's children, consecration is not an option because we serve a holy God, we serve a God who has taken a long time to work out a precious salvation. So it is important that: "With great diligence" says the writer "we attend to the things that we have heard." Do you know that we have to be very careful about the things we read in the Bible, the concepts of Scripture taught by our teachers, our Pastors, the sermons we hear, the Christian books we read, the praises we sing? we have to pay close attention to it.

Many people sin to take lightly the things of the Spirit and especially the call to holiness and I believe that the Bible is the opposite, it calls us to have great seriousness and to make a purpose that we are going to attend, we are going to take seriously , we are going to be very careful about the things that we hear and study about the Word of the Lord.

If we do not pay that level of attention, if we are not possessed by a sense of purpose and great commitment, we will not reach the goal of a holy life and a life pleasing to God because it is a struggle against the current; It is a fight against the flesh, against the mind, against circumstances, against people, against the world, against the devil, it is definitely a fight against the current and unless we make a tremendously firm purpose we will not get there.

So you see that Paul in the 12th chapter of Romans 1 also speaks that in light of the great things that God has done, he begs us, he is begging us to present our bodies as a living sacrifice, so we are going to see that too, right? And here in Hebrews chapter 2 the writer says the same right? "therefore" and you will see that he is talking about the Son and His great character as the angels and the Son of God, all these things right? "Therefore it is necessary that we attend even more diligently to the things we have heard, lest we slip away."

In other words here in Hebrews 2: 1 the writer says that we need to be careful because danger is always there. I know that there are Christians who say: well once saved always except that if God saved you and you cannot go to hell, you cannot slide; Hebrews is a letter that is characterized many times precisely by showing us that no, that we must be careful because it is possible to depart from the faith, it is possible at a given moment to lose one's commitment to the Lord.

You never lose your freedom you always have the right to reject God just as you always have the right to receive and accept Him. So we cannot be careless, we have an enemy as the writer also says in another passage, he says that Satan walks around like a roaring lion looking around for someone to devour, he says "therefore be sober and watch."

If we did not lose our salvation we would not have to worry about those birds as the parable of Jesus Christ says that they can come and steal the seed and tear it from our hearts. The Christian life is a tremendously serious thing and holiness is something that we have to make every day a new resolution to serve the Lord with holiness, with integrity; we have to desire holiness more than anything else in life because it is a battle against everything.

It is a battle against our own body, our own mind, our own biology and all the elements that make up this world and then we must use as a stimulus that effort and that love that God has invested in making us saved through His Son Jesus Christ and through of the precious plan that He has been elaborating throughout all of history since Adam and Eve fell in the Garden of Eden until this very moment when you listen to me God is always working. How sad it would be if we neglected such a great salvation.

Then the writer says: "Let us attend to the things we have heard lest we slip" lest we slip and turn away and lose our reward. The Bible also says that: "He who will endure to the end will receive a reward." It is a pity that there are many people who start the race but then take their hand off the plow and then lose their reward.

We are going to continue working on these two passages of Scripture in the next meditation so that we can see how they complement each other in that solemn call to holiness. God bless you, I say goodbye to you until our next meditation.