Giving Your Life to Jesus

Good morning, Happy Souls!

Bill Keller wrote a wonderful devotional today
that I highly recommend to you.  He has given
me permission to copy his e-mails, and I'm sure
he would be happy if you would share this with
people you know as well.

Read on.

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DAILY DEVOTIONAL   MONDAY JANUARY 23, 2006
(Galatians 2:20, 1 Corinthians 6:20,
Matthew 16:24,25)

Getting saved is not just about what we get, but it
is also about what we GIVE!  In our narcissistic,
"what's in it for me" culture, we have learned how
to market salvation to the masses like we do cell
phones, cars, and hamburgers.  In our zeal to win
people for Christ, we have been very careful to
focus on the benefits of salvation, making sure
people understood all the reasons why this is a
good choice, while being too afraid to tell them
the WHOLE plan of salvation.  We sell salvation
just like the late night infomercials sell weight
loss pills, whipping people into an emotional
frenzy by hyping all the benefits of getting saved,
but never explaining to them the FULL COST of
getting saved.  The "fine print" in the salvation
message is not what we get, but what we GIVE!

I am saddened when I hear people share the Gospel,
giving people an invitation to know Christ, but
never really explain what a person is actually
doing.  Please don't misunderstand me, I am
grateful for everyone who shares the Gospel, gives
people the opportunity to come to know Christ as
their Savior, but my point today is that we MUST
tell them the complete truth about what they are
doing.  When a person makes the decision to accept
Christ into their heart and live by faith, they are
surrendering their life to Him.  It is called
giving your heart and life to Jesus because that is
exactly what you are doing.  From that moment on,
your life no longer belongs to you, it belongs to
Jesus.  That is the critical part of the salvation
message so many fail to tell people.

We are quick to point out that if you accept Jesus
you will have the assurance of everlasting life with
God your Creator.  That is true.  It is our faith in
Christ, the One who died for our sins that allows us
to be reconciled with a Holy God and know that when
our brief journey through life is over we will be
with Him for all eternity.  We also make sure people
understand the tremendous benefits of being saved. 
At that moment, the Holy Spirit indwells a Believer
to supply them with the power of Almighty God.  By
accepting Christ as your Savior you have peace and
joy in your life that is impossible to know otherwise. 
You come to realize that your life has meaning and
purpose and experience the abundance of this life that
Jesus promised.  All of these things are true and need
to be pointed out.

It is easy to see why people would want to be saved. 
Most people on the planet can accept that there is a
Supreme Being or God out there.  It is not hard for
anyone who is honest to admit they have sinned, so
asking for your sins to be forgiven makes sense. 
Even the heathen with the hardest heart will admit
that one day he will die.  Everyone knows that is a
day each one of us will face.  So accepting Jesus
by faith to have the assurance that when this life
is over you will go to Heaven and not Hell is a
logical choice to make.  To also have the Holy
Spirit living within you, know a special peace and
joy, have a purpose in life and experience its
abundance, all makes the decision to accept Christ
very attractive and really something only a foolish
person would turn down.

So people make that eternal choice to accept Jesus
by faith.....and nothing really changes.  They wake
up the next morning in the same bed, the same
house.  They have the same family and friends. 
They go to the same school and have the same job. 
They have all the same problems they did the night
before, and maybe even a few new ones.  They do all
the same things.  Even though the Bible proclaims
that they are "born again," that they are a "new
creature in Christ," that the "old has passed away,"
their real, practical, day-to-day life has not
changed.  This is why so many people who accept
Christ are truly saved, but they never grow in their
new faith and many of them see very little change in
their life from BS (before being saved), to AS
(after being saved).

The reason is when they got saved, what was left out
or never really explained to them was the complete
story of accepting Christ as their Savior.  The part
of the salvation experience that is often left out
and never properly explained to people is the fact
that when you accept Christ into your heart and
life by faith you are giving your life to Him.  It
is an act of sacrifice and surrender, two words that
most people want no part of.  That is why this most
critical element of what it means to be saved is
never really spoken about.  The bottom line is, when
you get saved you are surrendering your life to Jesus
Christ.  Your life no longer belongs to you, it
belongs to the Lord.  Jesus made the ultimate sacrifice
when He literally gave His life in payment for your
sins, and when you get saved, you are making a
sacrifice of your life to Him.

This is so important since it goes to the very core
of what being a Christian, a follower of Christ, is
all about.  We have sacrificed, surrendered our
life to Jesus.  Our life is no longer our own but
now belongs to Him.  All we do, where we go,
everything regarding our life is now in the Lord's
control.  When you get saved, you are literally
giving Him your life.  That is why so many who know
Christ live without His peace, without His joy,
without any real purpose, without the victory, because
they have refused to fully surrender their lives to
Him.  That is why most of the false religions of the
world are so popular.  You simply accept their false
teachings but you can still live your life anyway you
want to.  When you become a follower of Jesus, your
very life now belongs to Him.

I love you and care about you so much.  That is why
even though Liveprayer reaches a massive audience
each day through the Internet and on TV and we have
people accepting Christ as their Savior every single
day, we do our very best to first make sure they
understand that in asking Jesus into their heart
and life by faith they are literally surrendering
their life to Him, that their life now belongs to
Jesus.  We send them a booklet that helps guide them
in the basics of their new faith, things like reading
the Bible and praying every day.  We do our best to
work with local churches to get people plugged in so
they can be properly discipled and start to grow
in their new faith.

When a person is saved, there is a supernatural
change that happens to them spiritually.  It is now
critical for that person to understand that their
life will never be the same again, that they are
different now, and to help them begin the process
of transforming their mind and day-to-day life to
be a true follower of Christ.  That doesn't happen
overnight, but over time. It is that process of
sanctification, or becoming more like Christ,
that begins at the moment a person is saved and
continues to their very last breath.  It is vital
that each person who knows Christ is not only
being discipled by someone more mature in the
faith at all times, but that they are giving of
themselves to disciple someone who is younger in
the faith at all times.  We can only grow in our
faith as we are helped along by those who are more
mature, and we have that same responsibility to help
those who are younger in the faith grow in their
relationship with the Lord.

I will be praying for you today.  Praying that as
you share the Gospel with people like our Lord has
commanded all of His children to do, that you will
clearly highlight the benefits of being saved, but
not leave out the fact that being saved also
includes surrendering our very lives to the Lord. 
We are actually cheating people by NOT telling them
the whole story, since our purpose in life, the
fullness of our peace and joy in knowing Christ,
the true abundance of this life, can never be fully
experienced unless we have unconditionally surrendered
our life to Christ.   Getting saved is not just
about what we get, but it is also about what we
GIVE..our life to Jesus Christ!

In His love and service,
Your friend and brother in Christ,
Bill Keller

***If I can help you in any way you can contact me
through my personal email at bkeller@liveprayer.com

***ARE YOU 100% CERTAIN WHERE YOU WILL SPEND
ETERNITY?  The fact is you will die one day.  At
that moment, you will either spend eternity with
the Lord or be cast into everlasting darkness
forever separated from God your creator.  To know
for certain you will be forever with Jesus, go to:
http://www.liveprayer.com/bdy_salvatn.html

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(C) Copyright 2006, Bill Keller Ministries.
All rights reserved

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May God bless you as you learn from this message!

Donald W. Mitchell, Your Dream Concierge

Copyright 2006 Donald W. Mitchell