At one point in my life I believed that I needed to focus on all the things that could cause me to fall away from or separate me from God.  I feared that I might not go to Heaven if I sinned–everything was a sin for me back then–drinking caffeine, reading fiction, spending too much time with non-Christian’s or ‘Christians’ who didn’t believe like me, wearing jewelry, thinking a wrong thought…  I was worried about ‘The Great Tribulation’–would I prove faithful to keeping the Sabbath and thus pleasing God and being fit to save?  I worried for my kids–was a I good enough parent so that they would be saved?  Would Satan be able to deceive me into believing something wrong–thus causing me to lose my salvation.  You name it, I feared it.  My focus was so much on myself and others (behaviors) that when I read verses like Romans 8:39, I couldn’t comprehend ‘NOTHING can separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus.’

Nothing can separate us from the love of God–Once Saved, ALWAYS SAVED!

When I stop and think about it now I realize how arrogant and blasphemous it is to put so much weight on what I did and so little on what God, through Christ, did.  I had missed out on so much as a ‘Christian’ and had sadly taught my children to live the same way (praise God I think they’ve gotten over it).  When I finally came to an understanding of the true Gospel of Jesus Christ, fear became the sin and all the rest dropped away–those are all things of this world which is passing away–and because I am in Christ Jesus the world or anything in it, no longer has a hold on me.

This morning I read,

‘The undiminished radiance, which is the result of abundant joy, is not built on anything passing, but on the love of God that nothing can change.  And the experiences of life, whether they are everyday events or terrifying ones are powerless to “separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom. 8:39).

In other words, we are secure!  As I contemplated how to illustrate security I thought of a pot of hot water setting down on a mosaic hot pad.  The hot pad would become hot but it did not affect the hot pad because it was built to withstand the heat.  Then I thought about a friend of mine who is a mosaic artist and how she showed me once how she plans out her design in advance (like God planned our lives out before the foundation of the world), she then creates a substrate with a form around it, then cuts the tiles for the mosaic–each cut specific for its individual spot in the design–then adheres them to the substrate with a bonding agent.  Once those tiles are secure she pours grout over the top, spreading it over and pushing it into the cracks until there are no air gaps which would cause weak spots.  After letting the grout set for a few minutes she goes back with a damp sponge and wipes off all the excess mess, revealing the beautiful mosaic pattern.  Once the grout is completely dry there is no moving the pattern–the grout, tiles, substrate, form, everything, is one.  Nothing can separate them.  Together they are ready to take the heat of a tea-pot, the splash of water in a mosaic fountain, or the pressure of feet on a stepping stone or whatever it was created to be subjected to.

That is our life in Christ.  If you have accepted Him as your savior, you are secure–f o r e v e r !  If you look to Jesus instead of the face of fear in all its forms, your heart will be filled with abundant joy and you will know that all will be well because Christ has conquered the world and because He’s a conqueror so are you!

Walk securely today.