So here’s the humbling and comforting truth of the gospel. Your obedience doesn’t initiate anything. Your obedience and mine only occur because God initiated a redemptive process that resulted in our forgiveness and transformation. We don’t obey to get his favor; we obey because his favor has fallen on us and transformed our hearts, giving us the willingness and power to obey. God’s work of rescue and forgiveness didn’t begin just before you first believed. It didn’t begin just before you were born. It began before the world was born. He placed his grace on you and wrote your story in such a
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