I often hear in my discussions on evangelism and it’s methods about how “we should get out of the way“ or how we know we got someone converted if they “professed with their mouth that Jesus is Lord and saviour.” I often wish it were true because then evangelizing my grandparents would be a lot easier if it was just a matter of getting them to repeat the magic words “Jesus is Lord and saviour.” However, though the means of professing may be easy and simple enough, the implications of those words that glibly slip out of our tongues aren’t at all that simple.
Consider with me Romans 10:9a, “because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”
Firstly, the matter was that of confessing with my mouth that Jesus is Kurios “Lord,” that is to give Jesus the title that Caesar was currently holding. This statement is nothing more than political treason. Consider another passage whereby Christ is affirmed as the one Lord, “yet for us, there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.” (1 Corinthians 8:6 ESV).
It is clear then that this passage imploring us to confess with our mouths that Jesus is Lord is not an emphasis on the means of mouthing out magic words - but rather the emphasis is on the implications of living a life under a King to whom even Caesar is subject. This profession of a lived-out allegiance to Lord Jesus and the faith that acknowledges his deity (God raised him from the dead - v.9b) is demonstrative of the heart that believes and is justified and the heart that confessed and is thus saved (Rom 10:10). Our profession of faith - the one that saves - is a profession of living faith, a life that pledges ultimate allegiance to the one Lord Jesus Christ's governing authority.
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