Hey, welcome to today's encouragement from Our Daily Bread.

The devotional for today titled One Door for All was written by Arthur Jackson.

The protocols at the restaurant in my childhood neighborhood were consistent with social and racial dynamics in the late 1950s and early 1960s.

The kitchen helpers, Mary, the cook, and dishwashers like me were black.

However, the in-restraint restaurants were white.

Black customers could order food, but they had to pick it up at the back door. Such policies reinforce the unequal treatment of blacks in that era. Though we've come a long way since then, we still have room for growth in how we relate to each other as people made in the image of God.

Passages of Scripture like Romans 10, 8 through 13 help us to see that all are welcome in the

family of God. There's no backdoor. All enter the same way through belief in Jesus' death

for cleansing and forgiveness. The biblical word for this

transformative experience is saved. Your social situation or racial status or that of others does

not factor into the equation. Verse 11 through 12 reads, as Scripture says anyone who believes in him will never be put to shame.

For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile.

The same Lord is Lord of all, and richly blesses all who call on him.

Do you believe in your heart the Bible's message about Jesus?

Welcome to the family.

Today's Our Daily Bread devotional scripture reading is from the Apostle Paul's writings in Romans

10, verses 8 through 13.

But what does it say? The word is near you. It is in your mouth and in your heart.

That is the message concerning faith that we proclaim. If you declare with your mouth,

Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him

from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified,

and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved. As Scripture says, anyone who believes in him will never be put to shame.

...