Randy Green's Blog

Proud Lawyers and Humble Saints – Part 1 Who Turned Out the Lights? – Part 1

Proud Lawyers and Humble Saints – Part 2

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Behold, as for the proud one, his soul is not right within him; but the righteous will live by his faith [Habakkuk 2:4].

In our last study we noted three positions which man can take with regard to eternal life. Two of them were cited by Habakkuk in the verse we quoted above. The other one, legality, was not. We already gave the Scriptural presentation of legality. Now let’s consider the other two positions man can take vis-à-vis salvation and eternal life.

Habakkuk penned his words in response to the Babylonians. Those fierce warriors were having a heyday. The peoples of the world were falling before them. No one could resist their mighty military.

But they were some of the worst idolaters ever! They perceived all their worldly success and victories as their own achievement. They were big and bad. They were self-made men. They conquered one nation after another, and they cruelly abused those they conquered. They needn’t fear, however, because they were invincible.

This is spelled p-r-i-d-e, PRIDE, dear friends. It is utter arrogance, and a concomitant disdain for fellow man accompanies it. They had their pantheon of Babylonian gods, yes, but those gods should consider themselves lucky to have the Babylonians in their service. “Just look at all we accomplished by our own prowess!” was the motto on the Babylonian seal.

Such was the way of Babylon, when it came to their eternal destiny. They were self-achievers, not by obeying the gods and keeping a set of laws, but by doing what they felt like because they were just that good! If anyone would ever make it to heaven or paradise or nirvana or wherever eternal life was, you just know it had to be them.

So much for the second position man can take vis-à-vis eternal life. This position, pride, winds up in the same place as does the first position, legality. Both pride and legality embrace the belief that man deserves eternal life because he is just that good. He earns his own way because he is good enough to do everything the Lord says.

The third and final position is faith. Faith has nothing to do with pride or legality. Faith is the opposite of deserving or earning eternal life. Faith begins with certain spiritual truths:

every man is a sinner
the wages of sin is death
ergo, every man must die, i.e., not have eternal life
the only way out is via a Savior
the Savior has no sin of His own for which to die
the death of the Savior pays the penalty for others’ sins
accepting the Savior’s payment for my sins affords me eternal life

Biblical faith is the way I accept the Savior’s payment for my sins. I don’t do anything to earn eternal life. The Savior already accomplished it for me. I don’t deserve eternal life because I am a sinner who deserves eternal death. The Savior has eternal life and freely provides me with it. I simply accept the Savior’s offer by believing His Word, the Bible. Voilà! Biblical faith.

We conclude our presentation of the three positions man can take with regard to eternal life. Which one do you take?

To further research this issue, I direct you to my book Leviticus: Volume 3 of Heavenly Citizens in Earthly Shoes. To purchase my books please go to:

http://www.amazon.com/Randy-Green/e/B00507WC86