Only Constant is God’s Love

Seasons change. Hair and clothing styles change. Technology is constantly changing. Even we change as we age. With everything changing around us, it can create a feeling of uncertainty. Here’s one thing that is constant. God’s love is constant, even if we change.

Brethren, I am speaking to you Gentiles. Inasmuch then as I am an apostle to the Gentiles, I magnify my ministry in order to make my fellow Jews jealous, and thus save some of them. For if their rejection means the reconciliation of the world, what will their acceptance mean but life from the dead? If the dough offered as first fruits is holy, so is the whole lump; and if the root is holy, so are the branches. But if some of the branches were broken off, and you, a wild olive shoot, were grafted in their place to share the richness of the olive tree, do not boast over the branches. If you do boast, remember it is not you that support the root, but the root that supports you. You will say, “Branches were broken off so that I might be grafted in.” That is true. They were broken off because of their unbelief, but you stand fast only through faith. So do not become proud, but stand in awe. For if God did not spare the natural branches, neither will he spare you. Note then the kindness and the severity of God: severity toward those who have fallen, but God’s kindness to you, provided you continue in his kindness; otherwise you too will be cut off. And even the others, if they do not persist in their unbelief, will be grafted in, for God has the power to graft them in again. For if you have been cut from what is by nature a wild olive tree, and grafted, contrary to nature, into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these natural branches be grafted back into their own olive tree.

Romans 11.13-24

Today’s lesson from Saint Paul got me thinking about salvation. That’s right. Today’s blog is NOT about hair styles and technology, but it IS about change. It is about OUR change in our attitude and faith in God.

If we hear what Saint Paul is saying, we are both comforted and bothered in the same moment. So long as we remain faithful, we are saved as members of the Church. The ‘moment’ we stray, the moment we stop believing, we are cut off from the Church.

Yesterday, I wrote about the blessings that come for all of us when cradle members of the Church return. Saint Paul says as much again today but then follows with a warning. If God is willing to cut off cradle members for unbelief, He is willing to cut us off too.

In practical terms, that means we are not guaranteed salvation beyond this moment in time, ‘just because’ we believe. The Jews believed until they no longer believed. The good news for us, and for the Jews, is that once someone returns in faith, they are grafted back in.

So, I guess that means we can be cut off and grafted back in repeatedly. Does that mean even our salvation changes ‘with the seasons’ of faith? This is what the Church means when we say, “We were saved. We are saved. We are being saved.”

We just hope, by God’s love and grace, we find ourselves grafted in at the right moment, before we die. I’m not sure I am comfortable risking the back and forth, timing it ‘just right’ so I’m grafted in before it’s too late. I prefer remaining in rather than all the back and forth.

That requires effort. It requires faith. It requires humility. It requires me to stand in front of my icons every day, asking God to forgive my lack of faith, and graft me back in for another chance tomorrow. Hopefully, today I won’t let Him down.