The Splash Effect

The Lord gives His promises and blessings only because He decided to love and show mercy on His chosen people. When we see these blessings in our lives knowing that we have sinned and continue to sin against Him, we are completely humbled by His grace and love for us and we praise Him. Every Christian loves to be blessed by God. The longer we are Christians and study God’s Word the more we understand our sin and how underserving we truly are of God’s blessings. This includes our salvation down to everyday blessings.

Not all love shown to us by God is something that gives us comfort. He allows the trials in our lives to come test our faith (James 1:3). By our faith being tested we learn that we can endure to the end by hanging on to the strength of God’s Word. This strengthens our relationship with the Father and is a necessary stepping stone to reaching the glory of Heaven and being with Him forever.

Remember, our Father does not need to know how committed to Him we are, if we would betray Him or how we would act through different trials. He knows. This is for our benefit. To show us what we would really do, where we really stand vs what we think we would do and where we think we stand.

While we go through these trials here on Earth we should count them all as joy (James 1:2). God can’t be tempted by evil and He Himself is not the One who is tempting us, but rather it is the fallen, sinful nature of ourselves and our fellow human beings that lead us into trials (James 1:13-14). But our Father is there to help us, to take care of us and we become closer to Him through this; that is why we should count it as joy. We endure to the end because He is with us and will lead us through it. His grace is truly awesome!

To see and experience God working in our lives is a humbling, and truly great thing. The answering of prayers, the grace, the love, the revealing of scripture and the patience of God with us is beyond our reach and comprehension.

Christians are not the only ones that love the blessings of the Lord. Even a lot of non-Christians love the benefits that the children of God get. They just want the benefit without obeying God and really, without Him altogether.

I have seen God work in my life. He has answered my prayers, revealed the meaning of scripture to me and so much more. One day a question came to mind. It was a horrifying thought, but one that I needed to have an answer to. Was God blessing me or was God answering my wife’s prayers and blessing her? While giving this question more thought, I realized a lot of people are under this delusion that God is blessing and taking care of them, when in fact they are just benefiting from the blessing that God gives to His children.

I decided to call this the Splash Effect; the name seems to fit.

How do I know if I am under this delusion? After thinking about this for some time and complicating it more and more, it came to mind that this really comes down to only one question. Are you a Christian?

To get that answer ask yourself these questions:

Do you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ of the Bible (Acts 16:29-31)?
Do you believe that Jesus is fully God and was fully man (Colossians 2:9, John 10:30)?
Have you been reborn and regenerated by the Holy Spirit and does your actions depict your new nature (John 3:3) (Romans 6:13)?
Do you believe that Jesus took your sins on Himself and took God’s wrath and laid down His life in your place, then accredited to you His perfect sinless life so that in the day of judgement you will be found worthy to enter heaven (Colossians 2:13-14, 1 Peter 2:24, 1 John 4:17)?

Some people will answer yes to these questions and say I do believe, but they lack the assurance that they are saved. This is a very fearful state for a Christian and God knew this, that is why the Bible addresses this issue in a few places. Peter writes in 2 Peter1:4-7 how we can find assurance in being a child of God. Peter says 8 things we should do to have assurance.

• Have faith. Faith is a great possession and a gift from God the Holy Spirit who directs your faith to believe in the life of Jesus, His works and the reason for His death and resurrection.
• In our faith get the courage to stand up and live for Christ in a world that can’t accept or understand Him. Continue to do what is right in the sight of your enemies.
• Study the truths of the Word of God to gain knowledge. God’s Word is the most important factor in life because it’s the absolute truth and the reality that will remain when everything else is gone. Therefore these truths are what everything else is measured to.
• Have self-control. We are to watch over the words we speak and the actions we do to make sure they line up with scripture. Don’t be hateful to friends, family or enemies. We need to always keep our pride in check knowing that whatever we do on our own can never please God.
• Persevere. When trials come, and they will, don’t talk bad to others or about them and murmur against God. Remember count all trials as joy.
• Don’t just play the part of a Christian, get godliness. Live as if you are in the direct sight of God always, which you are. Godliness is an inward affect that is shown on the outside. Continue to live the truth of scripture no matter what’s going on or who you are with.
• Have brotherly kindness for all brothers and sisters that are in God, no matter who or where they are. It’s a big family with every member being called by the Father Himself.
• Embrace love. Paul wrote in 1^stCorinthians 13:2-3 that if he had all knowledge and all faith, if he gave all his possessions to feed the poor and sacrificed his life but did not have love he would have nothing and be nothing. In 1^stCorinthians 13:13 Paul declares love is greater than faith and hope.

Peter sums it up in 2 Peter 1:10-11 by saying, ¹⁰ Therefore, brothers and sisters, be all the more diligent to make certain about His calling and choice of you; for as long as you practice these things, you will never stumble; ¹¹ for in this way the entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will be abundantly supplied to you.

Do not deceive yourself as many people will do, according to Matthew 7:22-23. Make sure through your love and obedience to God’s commandments in the Bible that you have been drawn by God to the Lord Jesus Christ unto salvation (John 14:15, John 6:44). In doing this you will know that you are not just taking part in the splash effect.