There is nothing more important to
our eternal lives than salvation. Having
been created in God’s image (Ge 1:27), we too
are eternal spiritual beings; we will live forever. For those who have received salvation, this
is great news, but for those who have not it should be frightening.
Biblical salvation is God’s plan to save man from his
condition of being eternally separated from God due to sin (an action or way of
thinking that is contrary to the will of God).
I say “Biblical salvation” because there are many various plans of
salvation. Most all religions have
one. They generally include a list of
things you must do, things you can never do, as well as numerous things that
you should and should not do. The lists
vary from one religion to another, but being instructed to abide by a list of
rules, regulation, rites, and rituals is common. Performance, religious activity, is the name
of the game. The implication is: if you
do the do’s and don’t do the don’t do’s, then somehow God will owe you for your
proper performance, and eternal salvation is supposedly your reward. This is actually describing religion, man’s
effort to make himself right with God, not salvation. Contrary to religion, the Bible rhetorically asks: “Who has ever given
to God, that God should repay him?” Ro 11:35
God’s plan, as revealed in the Bible
is quite different. However, even topics
of eternal significance are of little interest to those who believe they have
no need. How interested would you be in
reading about the importance of medical care if no one you know has ever been
sick or injured? Before sharing God’s
solution to the problem we have with Him, I will explain the problem.
God is perfect, holy. He defines what is good and right in Who He
is. God is not truthful because it is
the right thing to be, truth is superior to deception because in His being God
is truthful. Justice is better than
lawlessness without consequence because God is wholly just. The same is true of everything He is. No part of Him can ever be less than perfect,
holy.
Our being created in His image comes
with tremendous opportunity as well as responsibility. Out of ALL creation we alone possess the
opportunity to become sons of God. Being
a child of God is not a right or something inherent to the human race, only the
opportunity is. Sons are connected to,
or a part of, their parents through a very special bond. In order to be able to take advantage of this
great opportunity, we have a responsibility to be perfect, holy, or else this
is not possible. How are you doing with
your walk of perfection in God’s eyes?
You are not alone: “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” Ro 3:23
I say “in God’s eyes” because He
alone establishes what is right and wrong.
It is His being that defines good apart from evil. Many people today believe they can live a
moral life by following what seems right to them. But again, a caution comes from the Bible: “There is a way that
seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death” Pr 14:12. Having knowledge of good and evil in our
hearts is not enough to guide us through a righteous life since we do not
possess God’s understanding. Knowledge
without understanding results in separation.
It was never God’s intention or
desire for us to have instant access to the knowledge of good and evil: “but you must not
eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it
you will certainly die” Gen 2:17 God’s commands are not given to keep us from
enjoying this life. On the contrary, they
are instructions to keep us safe. This
first recorded command is no different.
God’s statement “you will certainly die” was not a threat of punishment for disobedience, but
rather a warning of natural, or supernatural, consequences to a poor choice. It was His plan for us to walk in spiritual
experience with Him as He did with Adam in the beginning. Relationship teaches and trains, bringing
understanding, whereas knowledge alone is dangerous. As with any loving parent,
discipline will come for acts of disobedience, but that is not what this was.
The first recorded act of sin was disobedience
to this warning of God. Through
misrepresentation and half-truths, God’s enemy deceived our first parents into
eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Many things happened as a result of this
first poor choice. Some were natural:
fear, guilt, and shame brought about by their knowledge of evil caused them to
hide, or separate, from God (Ge 3:10). Another was supernatural, or spiritual; man did
in fact die that day just as God’s warning said he would. That death was in his spirit. Since Adam and Eve, every person has been
spiritually dead, without access to the tree of life, disconnected from our God
and Father.
Mankind was now in a condition of
imperfection and separation that we could do nothing to repair. Imagine that there is an exclusive club that
you want to join for drivers with a perfect driving record. The only problem is, that one speeding ticket
you received years ago for going 1mph over the limit on the way to the hospital
with your sick mother. Even if you drive absolutely perfectly the rest of your
life you can never regain the status of perfect. Remember, God’s standard is perfection, not
because He is harsh, but because He is holy.
It is His standard that must be met to join His family, to live in His
house.
Immediately after our first parents
fell short of the glory God intended for us, He promised One would come who
would destroy His enemy and his plans.
He goes on to promise that this One would be our Redeemer, that He will
fix our unfixable problem of separation.
The Old Testament (the part of the
Bible before Jesus came) is filled with stories, pictures, and prophecies about
the One who would come. It teaches of
how He would come, where He would come, through whom He would come, what He
will do when He comes, and even how He would die. The most amazing thing of all, however, is
that He will be called Immanuel. This is
amazing because Immanuel means, “God with us”.
God Himself promised to send His Son to live among us to restore our
relationship with Himself.
When Jesus was born on this earth it
was in the right way, the right place, of the right people. When He became a man He did the right things
and even died in the right way; all in perfect fulfillment of the predictions
in the Bible from hundreds and even thousands of years before He came. Jesus came from heaven and lived a perfect,
holy, sinless life on earth (the only person ever to do so).
Remember I said God is wholly just,
meaning He cannot simply ignore or dismiss sin (violation of His law)
arbitrarily? If He were to lovingly forgive our sin without
consequence, He would be merciful (not giving us what we deserve), but not
just. If He were to lovingly grant
sinners eternal life in heaven for no reason, He would be gracious (giving us
what we do not deserve), but not just.
The problem we created for ourselves is only a problem because our God
is completely loving, merciful, and gracious, BUT ALSO JUST.
Because God loves mankind He has a
plan of salvation, the only one that matters.
His plan includes sending His only Son to live a holy, perfect life (Heb 4:15).
With the Holy Spirit delivering His essence to the virgin, He was not
even tainted through ancestry by the sin of His fathers as all of us are (Lk 1:35).
These two things make Him the only One who could ever be connected to
the Father by His own doing.
Living the perfect sinless life was
enough for Him to be connected to God the Father, but that alone only provided
us with an example of how to live. For
us to be saved from our sins, we needed much more. Condemned without cause and sentenced to
death, God the Father placed upon His only Son, Jesus, the curse of death that
each and every one of us deserved for our sin (Gal 3:13). When Jesus died, justice was served, the
death sentence was satisfied, and spiritual life was again available to the
guilty.
While Jesus’ sacrifice is offered to
each of us, His death does not automatically apply or take our place (Jn 3:36). We
must ACCEPT His offer; we must BELIEVE in who He is and what He did for us; and
we must CONFESS these things (Ro 10:9). If we do so Jesus says we are born again (Jn 3:3), and our spirits come alive (Jn 3:5)! This is the gospel, the good news, of Jesus
Christ. You can’t earn it. It is by faith alone (Eph
2:8&9).
“For God so loved the world that he gave his
one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have
eternal life. For God did not send his
Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through
him. Whoever believes in him is not
condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has
not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.” Jn 3:16-18
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