Take Heed!

Salvation 2025 | Day 20

For if God spared not the natural branches, take heed lest he also spare not thee.
(Rom 11:21 KJV)

Take heed! This caution is not for us to fear for our salvation or to be unsure, but it is a call for diligence and intentionality. Accepting Jesus as lord is accepting Him and His commandments as the government of your life. Just as the shoot does not nourish the roots but the other way round, so must our lives be influenced by Christ.

After Paul told us about how the natural branches (Jews) were cut off and how the wild branches (gentiles) were grafted in, he explains how we are supposed to live our lives thenceforth. In Romans 12:1, Paul writes, “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.”

Our only reasonable reaction to God’s mercy and grace towards us should not be misbehavior or negligence, but rather a complete offering of our whole self as a sacrifice to God. There is no room for boasting or for pride, but only an appreciation and an acknowledgement of the Jesus’s finished work.

Shall we continue to sin that grace may abound? Certainly not! To continue in sin is to discredit the vine that we have been attached to. Jesus and Paul warn us that there is a chance of cutting a branch from the vine. Yes, every branch that does not bear fruit will be cut off.

Everything required for us to bear fruit has been provided. We receive daily nourishment from our root and help from our husbandman. God has given us everything that pertains unto life and godliness. The only way we will not bear the fruit of God is when we ignore the grace of God. Just as the Jews were cut off because they did not accept God’s grace to them, so must we take heed lest the master do unto us as He does to everyone who rejects the grace of God.

Behold therefore the goodness and severity of God: on them which fell, severity; but toward thee, goodness, if thou continue in his goodness: otherwise, thou also shalt be cut off. (Rom 11:22)

Further reading: John 15:1–5, Romans 6:1, 11:21–22, 2 Peter 1:3