{"id":10042,"date":"2022-01-28T06:37:58","date_gmt":"2022-01-28T12:37:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/devotional-on-romans-4\/"},"modified":"2021-12-28T15:20:21","modified_gmt":"2021-12-28T21:20:21","slug":"devotional-on-romans-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/devotional-on-romans-4\/","title":{"rendered":"Devotional on Romans"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_15991\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-15991\" style=\"width: 960px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/P6239592.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/P6239592-1024x768.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"960\" height=\"720\" class=\"size-large wp-image-15991\" srcset=\"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/P6239592-1024x768.jpg 1024w, http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/P6239592-300x225.jpg 300w, http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/P6239592-768x576.jpg 768w, http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/P6239592-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/P6239592.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 960px) 100vw, 960px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-15991\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">2014 &#8211; Mt St Helens, WA<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>A \u201cme-story\u201d or a God-story? <\/p>\n<p>Romans 4: The story we\u2019re given is a God-story, not an Abraham-story.<\/p>\n<p>The Old Testament story of Abraham doesn\u2019t start with \u201cAbraham sought God\u201d or \u201cAbraham was a righteous man.\u201d  Rather, the focus is on God who approaches Abraham, makes promises to him, and calls him to follow.  Obviously, without Abraham\u2019s response there would be no story.  However, it\u2019s even truer that without God\u2019s first call, Abraham would have had no opportunity to obey in the first place.  In the book of Romans, Paul wants us to understand the route to righteousness.  We don\u2019t arrive at a certain place where the Almighty is impressed by us and decides to take us under his wing.  Rather, even when we\u2019re hopelessly lost the Lord seeks us out, calls to us, makes promises to us and then awaits our response.  The greatest thing Abraham ever does is to respond to what God does.  As I apply that to my life I find all the rules being rewritten.  If it\u2019s just me doing stuff, even things that impress others, it\u2019s not worth much.  However, if I respond to God\u2019s grace in my life, and then live my life in him, things happen that would have never otherwise been accomplished.  My life becomes, not a \u201cme-story,\u201d but becomes a God-story.<\/p>\n<p>Take Away: It all starts with the grace of God.  I plug into that grace by faith.<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A \u201cme-story\u201d or a God-story? Romans 4: The story we\u2019re given is a God-story, not an Abraham-story. The Old Testament story of Abraham doesn\u2019t start with \u201cAbraham sought God\u201d or \u201cAbraham was a righteous man.\u201d Rather, the focus is on God who approaches Abraham, makes promises to him, and calls him to follow. Obviously, without [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1529,1428],"tags":[13,1299,445,485,933],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10042"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10042"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10042\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15993,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10042\/revisions\/15993"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10042"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10042"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10042"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}