salvation – Somerset Church of Christ

March 3, 2026

Surrendering to God

Jesus said to his disciples very plainly, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me” (Matthew 16:24). He continued, “For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in return for his soul?” (vs. 25-26).

Obviously Jesus is asking rhetorical questions so that his disciples really understand that we can’t sell out our souls. Put another way, “why sell your soul to the devil?” Your soul is worth so much more than earthly riches. If anyone really wants to be a disciple of Jesus, he must deny himself, take up his cross (be willing to suffer) and follow Christ. This is the true definition of surrender.

Yet millions of people struggle with surrendering to God. People usually don’t admit it, but they surrender every day to lots of other worldly things. They surrender their time to vanity, chasing after nicer things, and workaholism to pay for those things. Jesus gives us a better way. In fact, he is the way, the truth and the life. There is no other path to salvation. There are no other doors. If we miss the Jesus boat, we miss it altogether. There are no second chances once we die. We must surrender to God.

February 25, 2026

Broken cisterns

Jeremiah, known as “the weeping prophet,” witnessed some of the greatest atrocities the Israelites had ever committed. They were doomed, on a clear path of self-destruction that was very plain to see. Despite his best efforts of warning them, the Israelites were dedicated to their path, even mocking Jeremiah along the way. At one point, Jeremiah warned them directly from God: “For my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water” (Jeremiah 2:13).

First, they rejected God as the fountain of living waters. Remember when Jesus met the Samaritan woman at the well? He offered her living water and, not understanding what he said, she questioned him. Jesus replied, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life” (John 4: 13-14). Of course, she came to believe that Jesus was the Savior and pretty soon nearly the whole village did as well.

Ironically, the Israelites who rejected God later on threw Jeremiah into a cistern that belonged to the king’s son. It was empty, proving Jeremiah’s point. Jeremiah was literally thrown into the metaphor that he was preaching about. They rejected God, the fountain of living waters, and they built their own broken cisterns. They were spiritually bankrupt. God is, and always has been, the source of living water. Jesus is our source of living water. The question is, are we tapping into Jesus as our source or are we building broken cisterns?

February 11, 2026

The gift of identity

A lot of Christians struggle with their identity in Christ. When they don’t know who they are, they don’t know what to do. When they don’t know what to do, they don’t know how to behave. So we have a world that is quite a mixed bag. But Peter gives both our identity and our purpose: “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light” (1 Peter 2:9).

Peter says this definitively. There is zero question who the Christians are. They are a chosen race. A royal priesthood. A holy nation. A people for his own possession. That identity is written in stone. Because of that, Christians’ purpose is to proclaim the excellencies of him who called them from darkness into his marvelous light. We all were sinners, lost and driven by our dark ways. But now we entered the saving light of Jesus our Savior.

This guides our actions and determines how we treat others. Paul said, “But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the fruit you get leads to sanctification and its end, eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:22). Our identity now is in Christ, and in him alone. We belong to him. We’ve entered his light and now proclaim the excellencies of him who called us from darkness into that light!

January 21, 2026

The gift of grace

Our theme is the giving heart: a journey to radical love. Jesus, who was very poor, was incredibly giving and God, as we know, is love. Jesus called his disciples to radically love others. We can’t love others when we are into ourselves. Paul emphasized this when he said that we all once followed the prince of the power of the air. He said, “among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, lie the rest of mankind” (Ephesians 2:3).

Like the world who doesn’t know God, we carried out the desires of the body and mind–living for ourselves and not caring for others. But God. God had different plans: “But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ” (vs. 4-5). God calls us to repentance and showered us with his mercy and saved us by his grace. Not only this, but he “seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus” (vs. 6). We literally have a seat at the table with God through Christ!

Paul is crystal clear that this is not of our own doing. Our salvation by grace through faith is the gift of God. We were created for good works but those works are not what save us. We do good works because we are saved. This is what sets us apart from the world. We should work every day to outpace the world in our giving. Our good works matter to others and they matter to God.

April 9, 2024April 10, 2024

If They Don’t Hear How Will they Know?

Paul told the Roman church that everyone who confesses that Jesus is Lord and believes in his heart will be saved, whether Jew or Greek (Romans 10:9-13). The Roman church had an issue with Greek believing Christians taking over the synagogues when the Jews were expelled from Rome by Emperor Claudius. The Jews were rumored to have made disturbances at the instigation or “Chrestus” (a misspelling of the Greek word Chrestos, or Christ). When the Jewish Christians were allowed back into Rome, the Greeks sort of pulled rank. The Jewish Christians appealed to being Jewish and being the reason they believed in God in the first place. It created tension in the Roman church and Paul wrote a letter to put them all on equal ground.

Now that Paul establishes that the Gospel is for all people, he turns to the need for Christians to confess and to preach: “How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? and how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching?” (Romans 10:14 ESV). These are perfectly valid questions and they, of course, are rhetorical.

There is a dire need for people to preach. Millions of people are dying without ever having heard the Good News of Jesus. Our faith comes from hearing: “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ” (vs. 17). If we are not investing in the sharing of the kingdom, God’s word will never be heard by people.

September 13, 2023

Straining Toward the Goal

There is an unusual way to budget that, frankly, ought to be the norm. It’s called PYF (pay yourself first). At first it sounds selfish, right? But the idea is actually the opposite of splurging on yourself. Instead, you budget in a way that pays your retirement, investing, and giving accounts before you even pay for necessities like mortgages, utilities, and food. Those actually come second in the budget. Then follow all the other essentials. Only after investments and necessities are covered should you budget for entertainment (subscriptions, eating out, etc.).

In this way, you plan for the future and don’t have to be wondering how to pay medical and electric bills in your 70s. But the majority of people don’t budget this way. I mention budgets because it’s really about goal setting. Most Christians don’t budget their time and resources with a pay-yourself-first attitude. In other words, we don’t invest in our salvation. Instead we “splurge” on other things that have nothing to do with our salvation.

Paul told the Philippian church, “Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:13, 14 ESV). Does this sound like someone who is wrapped up in himself or more like someone who is laser focused on “budgeting” his time and resources for the grand prize of salvation? Clearly it’s the latter. We too should be disciplined enough to strain toward the goal of salvation. One day it will knock on our door. We shouldn’t be surprised when it happens.

March 1, 2023July 15, 2025

Fearless

Happy Summer Solstice Northern Hemisphere

This year’s theme is God first. We’ve been talking about God and you–developing a deeper relationship with God. John says, “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God” (1 John 4:7 ESV). God loved us enough to send his only son for us. Therefore, John concludes, “Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another” (vs. 11).

We have confidence that God remains in us because he gives us his Spirit. Furthermore, “whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God” (vs. 15). This gives us absolute confidence for the day of judgment and we know that we will spend eternity with God.

John concludes, “There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love” (vs. 18). If we’ve really been perfected in love, Christians should have no fear of death or judgment. This gives us peace of mind and courage to teach others, knowing that we are secure with God.