“TO ALL WHO ARE … BELOVED OF GOD, CALLED TO BE SAINTS: GRACE TO YOU AND PEACE FROM GOD OUR FATHER AND THE LORD JESUS CHRIST.” —ROMANS 1:7-8
I am a saint.Wow.That sounds ridiculous to anyone who knows me, but according to the Bible, God’s people, believers in Jesus Christ, are saints. They are referred to as such throughout the Old and New Testaments.
We are saints because we are “beloved of God,” and He has poured out a blessing of grace and peace upon our lives.
The grace with which He blesses our lives is almost incomprehensible when you consider the general weakness and failure of the human condi- tion compared to the pure holiness of God. But He sees beyond our sin and flaws because He genuinely loves us.
It is like you looking at your children, knowing their faults, their weak- nesses, and even their inclinations toward sin. Yet you love them, you hope and yearn for the best for them, you long to make their lives full and rich and free of the burdens sin imposes. Your view of them is filtered through your passionate love for them and your willingness to sacrifice your life for their well-being.
God is never unrealistic about us. He knows us. He sees our hearts better than we can. But out of His love for us, He chose to pay for the dark and wicked side of human nature. When we are believers in the sacrifice of His Son, when we are cleansed by the blood Jesus shed on the cross, His view of us is filtered through His Son and His love, and He sees us as nothing less than saints.
The Bible is full of greetings to the saints, references to the “prayers of the saints,” the “hearts of the saints.” Over and over the body of believ- ers who followed Jesus are called saints. But most of them never regarded themselves as such. They just lived in the love and grace of God.
“A saint is never consciously a saint, “ wrote Oswald Chambers, “a saint is consciously dependent on God.”
II encourage you to step into your true identity. Embrace the fact that you are God’s precious child—His son or daughter—and yes, a saint. “God creates out of nothing. Wonderful, you say. Yes, to be sure, but
He does what is still more wonderful; He makes saints out of sinners.” — Soren Kierkegaard
