Q 36: How do we as believers learn to work out our salvation in this way?

A 36: As believers we work out their salvation by meditating in God’s Law, hiding it – and all God’s Word – in our hearts, and living in obedience to its teaching. (Ps. 1; Ps. 119.9-11; Matt. 22.34-40)

Jesus prayed that His followers might be sanctified by the Word of God (Jn. 17.17). But we must apply ourselves to this task. The Word of God is living and powerful, but it is not magic. Merely possessing a Bible, or even just reading it, will not help us to realize the goal of our salvation, which is to be increasingly transformed into the image of Jesus Christ (2 Cor. 3.12-18; 2 Pet. 3.18). We must delight in God’s Law, so that we “feed” on it faithfully and well, in a diet grounded in the Law of God. If we neglect reading, meditation, and study in God’s Law, we cannot hope to be sanctified for the difficult but joyous daily work of loving God and our neighbors (Matt. 22.34-40). If we would walk the path of righteousness that Jesus walked, we must read and study His Word, beginning with His Law.

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