Commitment Like Marriage

If I say I love my wife, but I never spend time with her, never care to ask her about how she’s feeling, hardly show any concern for what she likes and dislikes, sit around all day, don’t show up, flirt with other women, cheat on her, and watch things I shouldn’t, I may say that I love her, but we all know that ultimately, I’m a liar and a fraud - somebody who shouldn’t hold the title of husband. If I truly loved her, I would never achieve perfection, and trust me, I fail at many things often, but my life would reflect that love as a general way of living.

In the same way, how serious we take the Christian walk will reveal the true status of our relationship with God. While nobody can earn their salvation, how a person responds to their salvation once it occurs is an issue that many professing Christians ignore today. Ultimately, we’re all hypocrites in one way or another, and thankfully, we have grace from God through Christ for when we fail, but if we think we can claim the title of Christian and still live however we want, not care about God’s commands, shrug off theology, fill our minds with everything the world has to offer, get wasted every week, never share the light with others, never pray or repent, and just live in unrepentant sin, we are liars and frauds.

The Word tells us to examine ourselves to see if we’re in the faith, and to work out our salvation with fear and trembling. No joke! I say this in love: Just because we may have asked Jesus into our hearts as a kid and wrote down the date in our Bible, it means nothing if we aren’t daily walking with and submitting to Christ. Just because I have a marriage license and even a video of the event, if I don’t continue to actively show up for and pursue my wife, my marriage will dissolve. Marriage isn’t easy. It’s hard work, but when the work is being done, it’s so worth it. In the same way, the Christian walk is hard, but out of love for the Savior and His work on the cross for us, and true fear of Holy Creator God, it’s eternally worth it. Obedience is true worship.

1 John 2:4-5 says this! “Whoever says ‘I know him’ but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him, but whoever keeps his word, in him truly the love of God is perfected. By this we may know that we are in him”