Watch as Ray David opens Romans 10:5-13.
The Scripture
“For ‘everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.’” Romans 10:13
Romans 10:13 invites a new perspective on the struggles in your life. And it also invites a new of dealing with those struggles.
We all need to be Saved
We all need to be saved. This is not a culturally popular message. Society tells us the we are all masters of our own fate and that we are good enough. But the biblical witness is that there is something at our core that needs to be saved.
The first we need to be saved from is ourselves. There are patterns of behaviour in our lives that our destructive and injurious to ourselves and others. One of the ways this manifests itself is through scorekeeping in our interpersonal relationships. We need to be freed from the sense that we need to keep score and that other people need to get what they deserve. We claim to want justice, but usually we just want vengeance. But, instead, we need a new framework of forgiveness and reconciliation.
Saved From Wrath
We also need to be saved from the wrath of God. We all want a just and wrathful God to mete out his judgment on wicked people who commit atrocities, but the truth from scripture is that there is only one category of human person – sinners. We all need to be saved from the just wrath of God. We all live lives that are offensive to God, by not trusting in His goodness and word.
The world needs saving. Divisions are deep. Polarization is growing. There is oppression, war and disease. But if we look even closer we’ll see that our families need saving too. And if we look even closer we’ll see that we need saving too. The world exists of 7 billion people like you and me. We’re all in need of a saviour.
How will we be Saved?
How will we be saved? By calling on the name of the Lord.
You can make minor improvements to yourself through self-help, but all self-help really does is rearrange the furniture, when what you really need is a complete reboot.
The Gospel shows us that we are incapable of saving ourselves, but it doesn’t do this to lead us to despair. Instead it’s intended to strip us of any self-righteousness we have in ourselves, so that you we call on the name of the Lord and be saved.
Transferring Hope
Calling on His name is enough. To ‘call on the name of the Lord’, at its core, is about transferring your hope. We all live with our hope, confidence and trust in something. For most of us its in our pedigree, resume, financial portfolio, family, or perhaps even our own goodness. But if your hope is built on these things, then it is built on shifting sand. Those things can all fail. But to call on the name of Lord means to transfer your hope from all of these things, which will fail, to the Lord, who never fails.
Certain Hope
When you stand before the throne of God and are making your case for why you deserve heaven and not hell, what will you appeal to? That is the thing that your hope is in. But Christians know that their case will rest solely in Jesus. When you place your hope and confidence in yourself it is uncertain. But when you place your hope and confidence in the Lord, you will be saved. Because, in the Gospel, your saving is finished, certain and confident. If your hope and confidence is found in yourself then you’ll never know whether you’ve done enough. But if your hope and confidence is found in Jesus you can look to the cross and hear the words, ‘it is finished’.
Never Put to Shame
If we have even just a flicker of belief, and call his name, we will be saved. Preach your best sermons to your own soul. Believe in your heart and confess with your mouth. Continually tell yourself the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
When you know that you need saving and you call to God, you will not be put to shame. You will change. Your whole family will change. And you will become that force for good that you always wanted to be.
