That's too Easy

Do you use those store bought mixes to make your cakes or cookies? Sometimes I bake desserts from scratch, but the majority of the time, if I baked it, I used a mix. We use those because of the convenience factor; it is much easier to buy the box and add water or vegetable oil, eggs, or butter than to measure and mix all of the other ingredients. 

Several years ago one of cake mix companies developed a product they thought was going to be a big hit: a cake mix that said just add water. To the surprise of the company, their new product was a big flop. No one was buying it. It seemed like a good thing, but it wasn’t selling. After doing some internal polling they realized that the buying public was skeptical of a cake that only needed water. It seemed too easy. That company went back to the drawing board and tweaked their recipe; the new box said, “Just add water and one egg!” Sales immediately picked up, even though the new recipe required more work and more money for the costumer. 

Many people view salvation that way. We tell people it is a free gift, and all they have to do is trust in what Jesus has already done. That seems too easy. It seems too good to be true. We feel like we have to do more. I have to earn it. I have to work hard, or give more money, or get baptized, or say enough prayers, or read the Bible through in a year. But the Bible teaches salvation cannot be earned because it is a free gift, “not of works, lest any man should boast (Ephesians 2:9).” 

In Philippians 3 Paul gives many reasons he could have boasted if salvation were earned: he was an Israelite from the tribe of Benjamin, circumcised on the eighth day in accordance with the law, a Pharisee who was zealous for the law, a persecutor of those deemed as heretics, and one who was blameless. In his younger days Paul was banking on those things getting him God’s favor and a spot in heaven. However, after he learned that Jesus is the only way, he came to look down on the very things he once gloried in. “But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord (v.7-8).” He went on to say he viewed all his accomplishments as “rubbish,” which was a strong word for excrement. 

Paul hated the things which he once trusted in because they would deem the cross of Christ as worthless. If our accomplishments could save us, then Jesus died in vain. It really is that easy. Like Paul, we need to despise anything that we could trust in instead of Jesus because our righteous deeds are but filthy rags in the sight of a holy God. There is no need to add anything because Jesus Himself has done all the work.