Batteries Not Included

Ephesians 2:8-9

Did you ever receive an awesome toy when you were a kid for Christmas or your birthday and yet you couldn’t play with it because it said batteries not included? The person who gave the gift to you didn’t have enough foresight to actually give you the batteries to go with the toy and so it sat there, useless, you couldn’t play with it, you couldn’t use it.

Some might wonder if this is the way that God treats us when it comes to his gift of grace. That God has done 99.9% of the work for our salvation through His Son Jesus Christ. Living a perfect life and dying an innocent death on the cross to pay for all of our sins but he’s left that 0.1% for us now. To come to know him, to come to believe in him, to have faith. Is that the case that batteries are not included? By no means. God has not simply left us there but rather he has done the entire work of our salvation; not only the work done in paying for our sins but even bringing us to faith.

It says in Ephesians Chapter 2 verses 8 and 9.

Indeed, it is by grace you have been saved, through faith and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God not by works, so that no one can boast. (Ephesians 2:8-9)

Did you catch what it said there? It says that we have been saved by grace through faith and none of that, not the salvation, not the faith. None of it is by works so that no one can boast. It is a gift of God. God didn’t leave us in that place: batteries not included. But in fact he went that step further creating faith in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, working through water and through His Word to bring us this message of eternal salvation.

What a comfort that is for us. God has done 100% of the work for us to get us to heaven. There is nothing that we need to do. Nothing that we have done to earn it not even coming to faith. That also is a gift of God. Because of that we can know that we are God’s children, that we have the certain hope of everlasting life through him. Amen.

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