To Be Least

¹⁵What then? Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means! ¹⁶Don't you know that when you offer yourselves to someone to obey him as slaves, you are slaves to the one whom you obey--whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness? ¹⁷But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you wholeheartedly obeyed the form of teaching to which you were entrusted. ¹⁸You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness. (Romans 6)

      I was thinking about this whole concept recently. Before we became Christians we were slaves to sin. However, now that we have been freed from the bondage of sin we are now slaves to righteousness. As this passage states, we either are slaves to sin (which leads to death) or we are slaves to obedience (which leads to eternal life). As Christians we obviously love Jesus. "Jesus replied, 'If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.'" (John 14:23) Another verse that supports this idea is 2 John 1:6, "And this is love: that we walk in obedience to his commands. As you have heard from the beginning, his command is that you walk in love."
      So we are either slaves to sin, or slaves to obedience. When we become Christians we are now slaves to obedience. The only way we as humans can be saved is by God's grace, and because of this we love him. As the previous verses I pointed out stated, if we love God we will obey his commands. Previously, sin was our master and now Jesus is our master. We no longer obey our sin and we now are to obey God.

²²You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did. ²³And the scripture was fulfilled that says, "Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness," and he was called God's friend. ²⁴You see that a person is justified by what he does and not by faith alone.

²⁵In the same way, was not even Rahab the prostitute considered righteous for what she did when she gave lodging to the spies and sent them off in a different direction? ²⁶As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead. (James 2)

      This seems to all fit together. If someone claims to be Christian, but does not obey God, is not his faith useless? This is idea is supported by the well known verse in Matthew 5:13.

"You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men.

      When we are born again we are now slaves to rigtheousness, slaves to obedience. If we truly love God we are to obey him. Belief alone can not save you. If you have faith, but no deed you are like the salt that has lost its saltiness. "It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men."