You Are God's Temple: Devotions From Time of GraceSampel

Honor God Because You Belong to Him Our entire country’s central emotional value, the central theme of our history, the central goal for which our ancestors paid a terrible price in blood and treasure is freedom. Ever since we were young, we have been taught that the early colonists were oppressed by the British government, and so they declared independence. Since we were young, we have been taught the evils of human slavery and how a brutal civil war was needed to end it in our country. Freedom from God, however, is spiritual suicide. How do you feel about being purchased? About belonging to Someone else? Is that a form of oppression? Or do you find it liberating and exhilarating that God should think you worth claiming? St. Peter wrote these words of encouragement, showing the great worth God finds in you and the great roles to which he is calling you: “You are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light” (1 Peter 2:9). You have been bought at the price of the blood of Jesus. Don’t fear belonging to him. Prize it. Cherish it. It is your dearest treasure.