Saved By Grace

Finally got around to do Baptism Class with Y. Since I have been following up closely with Y and her life and hubby's an elder in church, we were asked to go through some materials with Y before she gets baptised. She is probably the only one in our small church to be going through baptism before the end of the year.

This is our first time going through baptism materials with someone (hubby was baptised years ago and I was baptised in Singapore). It also seems like the basic materials that you go through with a new Christian about his/her salvation. I thought that hubby and I partnered well in our leading yesterday. Rather, it was hubby who led and I filled in, being his helper :)

It was really good to be looking through parts of the Bible that speaks of the grace and mercy of God as we understand the full gospel of Jesus Christ (his birth, life, death, resurrection, ascension and coming return), who He is and what He has done for us. His death on the Cross and his resurrection paid our deserved punishment of eternal death. We are therefore made righteous before God. All these are not because of what we have done or are able to do (by earning brownie points or doing good works) but purely by His grace and mercy through faith, which is a gift of God.

To quote the concluding paragraph of the discussion: "When we reflect on our salvation and recognise that it was God's prior actions that drew us to Himself, we are humbled and exult all the more over God's amazing, undeserved, and glorious grace. We realise that, in the end, the difference between ourselves and someone who is unsaved is not our own superior goodness, intelligence, spirital aptitude or anything within ourselves at all. The only difference between us and them is the mercy and grace of God." Amen!