Just Once

Recently I was at a children’s service, where the main speaker addressed rows of scrambling, energetic kids in multi-colored shirts packed into the church pews.

“How many times do you have to pray to be saved by Jesus?” asked the teacher, grabbing the microphone cord, prepared to pull it with him into the aisles.

Hands immediately went up around the room, and the teacher pulled the cord and pointed the mic towards a little boy in a blue sweatshirt.

“After every time you sin!” he shouted.

“Every day,” said a little girl.

The innocence of children is humorous, and usually enjoyable. But sitting on a far left pew, I was struck by their honesty -- and their error.

How often have I fallen into that trap? To think that I need to re-earn, re-do, or re-pray to receive my salvation from Jesus Christ?

Countless times, I have fallen for the lie that even though I have accepted Christ, I can still do things for Him, and that just in case, I should pray and receive Christ again.

Just in case.

The teacher shook his head no, smiling and still hopeful, and pulled the cord to another aisle. He placed the microphone in front of another boy, who had been waving his arms frantically.

“Once!” he said. “Just once, and you never have to do it again.”

In Romans 5:8 it says, “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”

God’s love for us didn’t quit even though we were sinners. He expressed Himself beyond that, and was so compelled by His utter love for us, that He sent his son to take our punishment: death.

Then in John 5:24 it says, “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life.”

That’s it. There’s the truth that the young boy shouting into the microphone could grasp and I couldn’t.

You believe; you have eternal life. You believe; you pass out of death into life: real, full abundant life.

There is freedom in the truth. I am a sinner, and in this lifetime, I will never stop being a sinner.

I am still a sinner, He still loves me. And as God promises in the Bible, everyone who has the son can be assured that they have eternal life with him.

His promises will never falter.

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