TODAY’S MEDITATION – Your active obedience to Jesus makes your faith complete (Mark 3:7-11)

This passage is interesting on two levels as it reveals to us who we really are in the Lord. The Bible says Jesus is instructing the crowd and some people who were controlled by evil spirits were among them. Now, “whenever the impure spirits saw him, they fell down before him and cried out, ‘You are the Son of God'” (verse 11). My brother, my sister, does this not make you wonder? Many people believe in Jesus and say they know who He is and that is certainly true, but they don’t do what Jesus asks them to do to show that they know Him. However, the Bible also says that: “You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that—and shudder” (James 2:19). So what should we understand here?

First of all,that the evil spirits know that Jesus is the Son of God and they bow down before Him, yet they have no intention of following Him. However, what should concern us here is the crowd among us: many people are still in the crowd: they follow Jesus but do not understand the true purpose of his coming on earth. And the main reason they are among us is that they are after miracles. Another category of people walk with the Lord to hear His teachings, but the still don’t understand the way of the cross, that is why they have been wandering in their faith, they stagnate, they are spiritually unstable. My friend, all this is to say that knowing who Jesus is, or even believing that He is the Son of God does not guarantee salvation. You must follow and obey Him because “faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead” (James 2:17).

Therefore, we must understand today that the Lord expects of us that we demonstrate the faith that we claim to have! The actions and acts of service you offer Him to express your love for Him are not a substitute for your faith in Christ, they are rather a confirmation of that faith. It is only through active obedience to Jesus that your faith will be demonstrated and complete, that is why James reminds us what made Abraham a righteous man before God: “his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did.” (James 2:22). Stay blessed in Jesus’ name.