GraceLife Thoughts – The Spirit’s Call

Grace Thoughts

GraceLife Thoughts – The Spirit’s Call

How does the Spirit draw people to Christ? By love. The Holy Spirit draws dead people and pours out the love of God in their hearts (Romans 5:5). That fits perfectly with Paul’s words in Ephesians 2.

But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in Hiskindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. Ephesians 2:4-9

God calls and saves dead people because He is rich in mercy motivated by His great love with which He loved us. The Holy Spirit pours out God’s love into the hearts of the dead to make them alive in Christ. After God brings dead people to life by grace through faith, the Holy Spirit seals them as the guarantee of their future inheritance in Christ (Ephesians 1:13-14).

The Apostle John also reminds us that – “In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins” – and – “We love Him because He first loved us” (1 John 4:10, 19).

Sinners do not love God first. They can’t because they are dead in trespasses and sins and are children of wrath. Their lives are controlled by the world, their flesh and the devil. Human nature is opposed to God. Paul included himself when he wrote – “we all once conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, just as the others” (Ephesians 2:3).

God makes the first move to save us because only He can move toward us. We are unable to move toward Him. That’s because we are dead until He moves to make “us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved).” The Holy Spirit pours out God’s love into our hearts and draws us to Him through saving grace.