"Therefore know that only those who are of faith are sons of Abraham. And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel to Abraham beforehand, saying, 'In you all the nations shall be blessed.' So then those who are of faith are blessed with believing Abraham." Galatians 3:7-9
This is a revelation to us about how to live our lives.
On the one hand, Paul is clarifying the fact that the Gospel is not restricted to those who are related by blood line to Abraham. In fact, the only way to become children of Abraham is through faith. On the other hand, this is actually an explanation about how we can be true Christians. Just as the Jews could only claim heritage to Abraham through their faith, in the same way we can only claim discipleship to Jesus through our faith.
We have all been called to become followers of Jesus through our faith. And what does that entail? It entails a total dedication of our lives to Jesus. The neat thing about being followers of Jesus is the fact that we have lots of his teachings written down in the Gospels. We know how Jesus wants us to live. He calls us to put aside all of our judgments, our prejudices, our discrimination, and instead show our love for one another as signs of our love and devotion to God. We have so many invitations to follow Jesus that you would think that more people would decide to become followers. Again, it seems that it is because of the simplicity of the Gospel that we can scare ourselves away.
This Lent, take some time to read one of the Gospels (I'd recommend Mark because it's the shortest) and find out how you can become a closer follower of Jesus. Point all of the things you do in your Lenten devotion to God.
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