Psalm 65 & 66 (parts thereof):
God will be praised when all who owe him vows (that’s ‘all of us, deep down trying to live a sinless life; we all fail at that) come to Him and repent with remorse. NIV says (65:3): “When we were overwhelmed by sins, you forgave our transgressions.”
How God Shows that He Loves Us
Romans 5:8 (NIV) But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”
How Does This Apply to Me
Romans 3:22-23 tells us that we’re all accountable because we have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.
God Offers Us a Gift
Scripture informs us that the cost of our sins — the “wages of sin” — is death. Romans 6:21 says (NIV) that “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
How Do I Get This Gift?
How to receive that gift?
Romans 10:9-10: That if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you wil be saved.”
Some say that this is all confusing. And I agree that it can be confusing, because there’s some stuff that I still don’t understand. But I do know the following, which can be backed up by Scripture. I’ll fill in the references at some point in time.
What I Know:
- The Bible is Truth (“all Scripture is God-breathed”). That is, the breath of God (the “Holy Spirit”) gave the writers (around 40 authors, including Moses, Samuel, Paul and some of the other apostles, and a couple or more unknowns) the words (or The Word). See John 1. Whether this is metaphor or literal, it’s The Truth. Jesus is the Way and the Truth and the Life.
- No one gets to God without going through The Truth, The Way. That’s Jesus.
- The Old Testament is about man’s relationship with God. God created the universe and everything in it, including man (Adam and Eve). [ the following is metaphor … I don’t know how it really works, but it’s my way of thinking about it). Adam’s and Eve’s sin turned on the SIN gene in each of them and therefore all their offspring (which is all of us) are marked with SIN too. If we STAY marked with SIN through our lives, and then we die, that SIN marker is still on.
- Unless … it’s not on.
- But … how does one go about turning the SIN marker off? [this marker is metaphor; it’s just a way to think about how we’re marked; we’re not clean but unclean.
- In the Old Testament, sacrifices were used to atone for the sins of the people. Sacrificing is hard because it involves death or something you love and/or have worked hard to develop. When Israel would honor the sacrifices, it demonstrated to God that they were sincere in their repentance. They felt actual remorse, vowing to never sin again.
- Each year (at Passover) a perfect lamb would be sacrificed for the people (well, to God, to save the people).
- The perfect lamb that we see on the throne in heaven in Revelation is Jesus Christ.
- He was perfect (he never succumbed to the temptations that Satan threw at him).
- He didn’t deserve to die, but he accepted the call from God to fulfill the requirement of sacrifice.
- He died on the cross for all of us, including you and me.
- Jesus arose from that grave. He was resurrected! That demonstrates his power over death, his victory over Satan, and the eternal life is a very real thing.
- If you confess that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart God raised him from the dead, then you are saved.
Okay
That’s not simple, but I think it’s straight forward.
Just remember this: God Loves You. And He Wants You to Love Others (where Others means Everybody).
Show somebody some love today.