“Saved To The Uttermost”

Hebrews 7:22-28

22) By so much was Jesus made a surety of a better testament.

23) And they truly were many priests, because they were not suffered to continue by reason of death:

24) But this man, because he continueth ever, hath an unchangeable priesthood.

25) Wherefore he is able also to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them.

26) For such an high priest became us, who is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and made higher than the heavens;

27) Who needeth not daily, as those high priests, to offer up sacrifice, first for his own sins, and then for the people's: for this he did once, when he offered up himself.

28) For the law maketh men high priests which have infirmity; but the word of the oath, which was since the law, maketh the Son, who is consecrated for evermore.

O

ften, one hears of God’s salvation plan and desires what has been promised, yet counts those promises for the present only. What a wealth of blessings we forfeit by not accepting His promises for the future, as well.

Scripture lets us know that we are to live “one-day-at-a-time.” In short, we are being admonished to accomplish what we can daily. For we cannot always be sure that there will be a “tomorrow.”

The Lord saved us for us to be saved to the uttermost. He made no allowances for us to do things “halfway.” If less than our best were acceptable, He would not have had to give His best. But, He gave His best that we might be our best. In essence, this is the entire focus of scripture. From the beginning of time, events were documented to show us that Man’s best effort is inadequate to meet God’s standard. In that He requires all to meet it, it must and can be done through Him, alone.

We know that we were powerless without the Lord in our lives. Oh, yes, we got “lucky” and were able to accomplish things, periodically, but we had no way to make any lasting changes in our life’s situations. So, since we acquire all of the power we need upon salvation and it is His Spirit which grants this, He has every right to expect to get the maximum benefit from our lives.

Churches are full of people with “good intentions” and if one could get to heaven on their strength, more would make it than not. Unfortunately for many, it takes salvation, determination, and commitment to get to heaven. This means, then that with “good intentions” only, one will most likely get “sidetracked” in the face of adversity. Many use not understanding things as an excuse for being unable to comply, but the fact is, that in most cases, the Lord is merciful and transcends our “understanding’ so that He can bless us.

No doubt, we frequently have problems because we do not remember what the Lord has done. If we would remind ourselves that at the point of salvation, it was necessary to believe God, then would we have such problems believing Him later? We see by the fact that we are saved, that believing the Lord has its benefits. This should transfer to our life after salvation.

When we received this gift called the Holy Ghost, we were given more than just the ability to speak with other tongues. What He brings into lives is the power and enthusiasm to be able to turn our backs on sin. He does not reside in us to lessen our “fun” or make our lives miserable, but He has given Himself to us that we might wholly dedicate ourselves to His service.

We need to be able to communicate to other that by being in Christ, we have already been delivered from everything, whether the problem be physical, mental, spiritual, financial… we have been taken from the “gutter” to the “utter,” not just the “curb.”

Thanks to Jesus, the Power exists within us to be able to keep ourselves encouraged and face adversity with confidence and peace. When our trying times come, we could help ourselves immeasurably by acknowledging by whose power we stand.

When tested, God’s expectation of us is for success, not failure. In that we now have all that we need to be able to accomplish whatever task is set before us, God has every right to expect us to stay out of sin. No one that He invests with His Spirit does He ever expect to sin. However, His goodness is shown in the fact that if we do, He provides a means for us to return to Him.

You know, it is about time for us to learn that if we are to make it we must learn to praise God! Trials and tribulations will come and one is shown his own commitment to God by remaining saved through them. Therefore, if we can never stand or withstand anything, how saved are we?

Under no circumstances should we ever be tempted to (withhold) our praise from God, for nobody, could have or ever will be able to do for us what Jesus has. So, no matter what the devil presents and no matter how convincing he might like to make “presentations,” the harder he “hits” us, the more we ought to praise God.

It seems as if at no point in history have men been so unwilling to accept responsibility for their actions. This is particularly true of those calling themselves “saved” When we fail to meet God’s standard and show ourselves. The fact is, that Jesus does nothing halfway. When man was made, he was the best God could make—yet, he still failed Him. Obviously, God already knew that fleshly man could never be sinless. So, before he was even made, God has already set-up the point in history where man would receive the power to be exactly like Him. This should be no surprise from a God who saves—and does everything else—“to the uttermost.”