Is Jesus truly my King? Am I a Kingdom Person who follows Jesus’ admonition to seek first the kingdom of God? (Matthew 6:33) Or do I inadvertently give in to what Charles Hummel calls the tyranny of the urgent – the seemingly important and constant demands on my time and energy? In my understanding of “faith” have I grown beyond that wonderful moment of initial justification as I confessed Jesus to be the Son of God and the Lord of my life? Have I come to the realization that genuine faith cannot be defined as, and moves beyond, belief and acceptance of Jesus as my savior? Genuine faith colors and directs all my actions until the day I join my King in eternity. We often speak of being saved by faith. The scripture also makes it clear that this same saving faith also demands a total and permanent surrender to the King of Kings.

I have been reading Salvation by Allegiance Alone by Matthew W. Bates in which he explores the need to integrate our concept of “faith” with the allegiance that subjects are expected to give to a king. A king has absolute authority and must be obeyed without question. Jesus is the King to whom I must give total allegiance. All that I do and all that I am grows out of the expectations and demands of my King. The opening chapter of Bates’ book stirred up some rather random thoughts that keep demanding my attention.

• As is made clear in various scriptures, the only thing I can offer to God in the process of my justification is my faith. They are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.  God presented him as an atoning sacrificein his blood, received through faith… Romans 3:24,25.  None of my repentance or goodness can take away even one sin. For justification, I must trust in what Jesus did on the cross when he took on the guilt of the whole world.  Amazingly, the cross enables God to exchange my sin for the righteousness of Jesus. He made the one who did not know sin to be sinfor us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. 2 Corinthians 5:21.

• I can only talk about being saved by faith if I understand that accepting the grace of God and the accompanying salvation which is based on my faith demands that I also immerse myself in the good works for which I was created in Christ Jesus which God has prepared for us to do. Ephesians 2:8-10 talks of the amazing salvation God has given us by his grace through our faith. But this passage also delineates God’s expectations for the redeemed. For you are saved by grace through faith, and this is not from yourselves; it is God’s gift— not from works, so that no one can boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared ahead of time for us to do. Do we rejoice in the first part of this passage but fail to notice and move on into the full Christian life described in the last sentence? Suddenly, faith becomes a 24/365 way of life.
• What is the faith which leads us beyond justification into sanctification and allegiance? It is best grasped by understanding the definition of faith, Now faith is the reality of what is hoped for, the proofof what is not seen. Hebrews 11:1, and how it was applied in the lives given as examples of that faith. As these stories verify in Hebrews 11, saving faith involves total allegiance and commitment to God. It is a willingness to do whatever God calls us to do, even when I do not understand it and even if it results in a martyr’s death.
• Sanctification involves a total change in my life. 1 Corinthians 1:2 declares that we are sanctified and as such are called to be saints. What does a sanctified life look like? Does it go beyond avoiding or at least hiding the “big” sins from view? Somehow, I must come to the realization that sanctification is nothing if it does not totally change the focus and behavior of my life. Sanctification is my answer to God’s call, “Be holy, because I am holy.” (Leviticus 11:44; 1 Peter 1:16)
• James 2:26 says, For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead.  Am I trying to maintain a semblance of life in a dead spiritual body by repeatedly claiming to believe in Jesus as my personal savior? (Think about a well-dressed and cosmeticized body in a casket.) Have I progressed into a mature faith of total allegiance to the King that moves me beyond that initial moment when I took Jesus as my savior?
• Only when my faith has matured from belief into allegiance can I begin to understand Jesus’ call for me to take up my cross every day and follow him. If anyone wants to follow after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross daily, and follow me.  Luke 9:23

• What is the point of going to church on Sunday and meandering through the “acts of worship” if Monday through Saturday my focus is on temporal things and my ethical and moral life is not particularly different from the non-Christians around me? That type of life does not portray the faith that equates with allegiance.
• The faith that saves is the faith that transforms my life so completely that  I live in total allegiance to my King. Anything less wastes both my time and God’s love.

A final question: Does King Jesus see me as having total allegiance to him?