24 Days to Reflect on God's Heart for RedemptionSample

Called into service in redemptive history

“I would not have known what it was to love Jesus, and my soul would have been lost.”

In 1883, a little girl came to live at Buckner Orphans Home in Dallas, Texas, founded by Dr. Robert Cook Buckner. She came with “morals badly impaired and language shocking.”

One night, when Dr. Buckner had offered prayer and it was time for the children to go to bed, the little girl threw her arms around one of the matron’s necks, her big brown eyes streaming with tears, and exclaimed, “O, if I hadn’t come into this home, what would have become of my soul? I would not have known what it was to love Jesus, and my soul would have been lost.”

Since the very beginning, the undercurrent of Buckner’s ministry has been the redemption of lives for God’s purpose. This little girl’s story and stories of thousands across generations dispel what was once traditional thought - that social ministry and evangelism were by nature mutually exclusive.

Personal faith in Jesus as your redeemer goes far beyond solving the spiritual problems we have with sin. Redemption involves conforming everything about us into the purpose God has for our lives to bless us and those around us according to his plan in redemptive history for us and others around us.

There is a redeeming aspect in our salvation, and yet our salvation is much broader and deeper than redemption. Redemption speaks to what happens to us at the point of our salvation, but also reaches backward to the pain of our lives and forward to show us how the redeemer makes all things new and how that newness connects with what God is doing in human history. We are saved by our Savior and redeemed by our Redeemer, who calls us into action and full-time service for His purposes in redemptive history.

Reflection question:

• Reading Galatians 3:14, how is your redemption meant to serve others?