Daily Bible Verses for 5/3/2017

Daily Verse(s)
But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved).

Reading Notes
Two things were true before our salvation. First, we were enemies of God and we were helpless to save ourselves. And secondly, we did not have the ability to earn our way into heaven. The Bible has made it clear, there are no works that mankind can perform, which will make us right in the eyes of a holy God! There is nothing we can do to earn salvation and force God to let us into Heaven. We are all dead in our trespasses and sins, and because of our sin-nature our hearts were dead toward God and we had no way of reconciling ourselves back to God. Moreover, we were prisoners of sin marching captive behind the one the Apostle Paul calls the “prince of the power of the air,” who is Satan. We were undeserving of freedom, because of our enmity toward God and yet Jesus set us free, by giving His life for us on the Cross of Calvary. Jesus’ death on the cross was for us, He took on the cross because of His love for us and because it is God’s will that all people spend eternity with Him in Heaven.

The Cross of Calvary is the ultimate expression of God’s love and grace toward us, through which God has given us eternal life in place of death. New life given to us as a free gift, appropriated by our faith in Jesus. Dear child of God, it doesn’t stop there, Jesus also gave us an inheritance in Heaven as part of the family of God. We are saved through our faith alone in Jesus alone because of what He did for us on the Cross of Calvary. And with our salvation through faith comes adoption into a new family. Through faith we are adopted into the family of God as children of God. In addition, we also become joint-heirs with Christ in the kingdom of God. Why? Because God loved us with such a great love, that His mercy set us free from captivity. God’s love for us is so great, that God Himself paid the price for our freedom. Jesus the living God of Heaven stepped out of eternity and took on humanity with the incarnation. And because of His great love for us, He alone has physically freed us from the bondage of sin, through His death on the cross. And because of His blood shed for us at the Cross of Calvary, we now have eternal life through Him alone, by faith alone. Therefore, having been saved by such grace, because of His rich love for us, who are we not to praise God through Christ Jesus our Lord?