Produced
By
Theological Seminary
Have you
asked yourself what is life? There is no
doubt that all of us have, or will, ask this question at some point in our
lives. Is it simply the beating of the
heart in our bodies or a vapor, which comes for a short time and then suddenly
disappears again? What exactly is the
purpose of life? Is it simply to be
born, to spend a few years of happiness or unhappiness on this earth and then
simply to pass away? The epistle of
James in the fourteenth verse of the fourth chapter tells us that our life is
but a “vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth
away.” Although life may seem
long, in comparison to eternity our life span is but a split second. We begin with infancy and grow into
adulthood, and soon must accept our inevitable mortality. We are reminded every day of our mortality by
seeing love ones pass away as well as, co-workers, the rich, the famous, the
powerful, as well as the not so rich and not so famous or not so powerful,
absolutely no one is immune.
Our
circumstances in life are always changing and we are also changing, but is
there really something constant that we can cling to? Is there something solid that you can depend
on, something real, which doesn’t disintegrate eventually; something pure that
doesn’t get tainted? Is there really a hope which doesn’t end in
disappointment? Is there a life which is
true, full and completely satisfying, that transcends even our
mortality? Well, yes there is. It is to be found in Jesus Christ. Do you
know Him? Many have heard of Him, but
the question is do you really understand who He is and what He has accomplished
on your behalf. Even if you don’t know Him, He certainly does
know you. He loves you and it is He and
He alone who can satisfy you fully and give you the kind of life your heart is
longing for.
Listen to His
words from the Gospel of John where He states, “I am the way, the truth and the life; no man cometh unto the Father,
but by Me” (John 14:6). With these words, Jesus excluded
everyone except Himself as the means of coming unto the Father. According to the Lord’s words we don’t come
unto the Father by the Virgin Mary, nor by Buddha or Mohammad, or even by any
types of good works, only by Him and Him alone!
The Bible states that outside of Him you are on the wrong road,
condemned to death and eternal punishment.
Again, in the
Gospel of John, in the third chapter we have some verses which declare how we
will avoid the condemnation that keeps us from being joined with God the Father
forever. In John 3:15-18 we read that Jesus states, “15) That whosoever believeth in Him (Jesus) should not
perish, but have eternal life. 16) For God so loved the world, that He gave
His only begotten Son (Jesus), that whosoever believeth in Him
(Jesus) should not perish, but have everlasting life. 17) For God sent
not His Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through
Him might be saved. 18) He that believeth on Him is not condemned:
but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath
not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.”
Therefore,
Jesus offers true life without exception to everyone who will accept it. He offers it to you and to me, to all of
us. If you accept it, you will find the
real purpose of life with an eternal destiny. You will not be living in vain
but instead life will have an infinite value for you because God has a plan for
your life, a plan of peace and security, and it is worth everything to discover
that plan. Yet there are many people who refuse to discover it because they have
not understood that the apparent losses do not compare with the present and
future gains that are only found in Him.
In the Gospel
of Matthew we read that, “heaven can be entered only through the
narrow gate” (Matt. 7:13-14). In
light of the sermon that the Lord was giving, we see that He was comparing the
wide gate to the outward righteousness of the Pharisees. The Pharisees sought the path of
righteousness through their self-righteous external system of good works. If those that were listening to Jesus’ words
followed the Pharisees’ teaching, their path would also lead to
destruction. The narrow gate and road
discussed here, was a reference to Jesus’ teaching, which emphasizes not
external requirements but an internal transformation. Even the Lord in Matthew 7:14 acknowledged that few would find the true way, the
way that leads to eternal life, which is a reference to heaven as appose to
hell. The Pharisees and Scribes had
fooled themselves into believing that they were righteous and others were
sinful. Yet, the fact is, as Romans 3:23 tells us, “…ALL
have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.”
We have all come short of God’s glory because His glory is
perfect and none of us can claim perfection.
You may ask, “If perfection is
required, then who can be saved?” This
is the very question that the Lord’s disciples asked Him in Matthew 19:25. I give you the same answer that He gave them in the next verse, “With men this is impossible; but with God
all things are possible.” This
is why God sent His Son into the world, not to condemn it but to save it. Jesus Christ alone is the only person who can
claim to be perfect. Hebrew 4:15, speaking of Jesus
Christ as our High Priest, states that He was “in all points tempted like we are, yet without sin.” This
is why in Romans 3:24-25 Paul
continues by stating that we are “24)…justified
freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus; 25) Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through
faith in His blood…”
It was the sacrificial
death of the Lord Jesus Christ that paid the price for all sins and secures the
release of the condemnation that the apostle John wrote about in John 3:18. The word “propitiation” in Romans 3:25 literally means, “means of
forgiveness,” once again, letting us know that Jesus Christ’s
sacrificial death is the means of us being forgiven before a holy and perfect
God. We are made righteous enough to be
joined with God when we confidently accept this great message of
salvation. This is the faith of which
the Bible is speaking. Since it is Christ, and not we, who accomplished this
great work, there is absolutely no room for boasting on our part, and the
reason that Ephesians 2:8-9 states,
“8) For by
grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves:
it is the gift of God: 9) Not of works, lest any man should
boast.”
My friend, do
you attach any importance to your soul?
What value do you give to this part of yourself, which will live beyond
the grave? Our stay on this earth is very
short compared to the endless eternal state that will follow. Do you know that after death your soul will
continue to live forever, either in heaven or in the lake of fire? What is your choice? Do you choose to go through the narrow door
known as Jesus Christ and find real life, new eternal life that can begin
today? Jesus has accomplished everything for us and you simply need to believe
in what He has done, and that He has done it for you personally. You have to believe that by dying on the
cross He took the load of your sins and that by shedding His blood He carried
the punishment, which those sins deserved.
Yes, Jesus
has accomplished everything and there is nothing left for you to
do but to accept this gift. Therefore,
you can come to God by passing through Jesus, who is the only way. If you humbly recognize that you are a poor
helpless sinner who has nothing to offer and ask Him to forgive you on behalf
of the Lord’s substitutionary death on the cross, He
will do it. He will give you His Holy
Spirit to purify you and live in you.
Then you will find that you are on the narrow road of true life; this is
real Christianity. Day by day as you
follow Jesus your heart will be at rest and He will give you strength to face
the rigors of life. Death itself will
not hold any fear for you because for you it will simply be the gateway to
heaven. As a believer in the saving work
of Christ you can be assured that death will simply mean that you will be, as 2 Corinthians 5:8 tells us, “absent from the body and present with the
Lord.”
Have you ever
thought about the fact that the sky seems to go on forever? We can look upward and, even with the aid of
the most powerful telescope, not see the end of the universe. There is a mystery about the universe that
has puzzled mankind since the beginning of time. Mankind has always asked the
question of where the universe came from and where it ends. So likewise, there is a mystery about man as
well. You look within yourself and ask, “where did I come from, where am I going,
why am I here, what is it in me that thinks and feels and dreams?” “Why do I
feel joy when I see the beauty of creation or hear the heartbeat of life, why
do I feel sad because it’s going to fade and die?” “What is it in me that wants to love and
reach out to communicate, that tells me there is a difference between right and
wrong? Why do I search for meaning in
life and why do I fear death?”
You and I are
part of this physical universe and yet we hunger for something more. There is a longing in us for something real
and sure and eternal, a longing for God Himself. With our five senses we can
explore this natural universe and yet we come to the end of what our senses can
discover when we come to the end of the physical creation. If we want to make contact with spiritual
reality then we must make an experiment in another realm, an experiment of
faith.
In the area
of science man takes the initiative, but in spiritual matters it is God who
takes the first step. In fact, He is
already reaching out to you right now through the words that you are reading
this very second. You can come to know
Him by taking some profound, yet simple steps:
STEP
1. Realize that God loves you and He has a plan for you. In Genesis
1:26 the Creator said, “…let
Us make man in Our Image,” and that means God has made you to find
fulfillment in a personal relationship with Him. He is a God of love, and yet His love isn’t
soft or sentimental, it is strong and holy and just. God is absolute perfect purity. He is brighter
than a thousand suns and there is absolutely no darkness in Him. This perfect and holy God has made man to
live in peace with love and with a real sense of purpose. Well, you may ask, if that is so, why the
agony, the violence, and the despair in the world and why this emptiness and
searching that is within me?
STEP
2. Step two gives us the answer to that question. It tells us that man has
sin and because of his sin he is separated from God.
Spiritual rebellion is the most basic cause of our human problem. The Bible states in Isaiah 53:6 that, “All
we like sheep have gone astray, we have turned every one to his own way…” Sin is more than just a bad habit. Sin is false pride, it is egotism, it means
that we deny the true God or we ignore Him and try to play God ourselves, as
did the religious leaders of Jesus’ day.
They tried to achieve entrance into heaven by their own means rather
than by God’s required means. To strive
for heaven by another way other than the saving work of Jesus Christ is the
epitome of the same prideful self-righteous arrogance of the religious leaders
in the Lord’s day.
The Bible tells us in Romans 6:23 that “…the wages of sin is death, but the Gift of
God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” You see, you may be alive mentally and
socially and physically and yet be dead spiritually. You’re like a flower that has been cut off
from its roots, you are not really living, but instead, you’re
just existing. Your contact with your maker has been broken and that’s
why you are born restless, lonely, guilty, afraid, and without hope. The end result is an eternal banishment from
a just and holy God.
STEP
3. The third step is to realize that God loves us in spite of our rebellion,
and in Jesus Christ He has made a provision for our sin. The Bible tells us in 2 Corinthians 5:19 that God was in
Christ “reconciling the world unto
himself.” Two thousand years ago
He gave us a personal demonstration of what He is like. He did this in the life of a man by the name
of Jesus Christ, who was God in human form. Jesus tells us in John 14:9 that, “…he that hath seen me hath seen the
Father.” Jesus came into the
world to bring us back to God, even at the cost of His own life. He states in Matthew 20:28 that He came, “…to give His life as a ransom for many.” He committed no sin, yet He carried our sins
in His own person on the cross, and because of this Jesus Christ is the bridge
by which we can come back into a personal contact with God. This is the reason He said, “I am the way…no man comes to the Father but
by Me.”
You see, to restore that broken contact, to come to know
true liberty and have that personal relationship with God, we have to receive
Him personally. Just as it is not enough
for me to know and believe that a bridge exist, but I also have to commit
myself to stand and walk on that bridge in order to exercise faith in it. So likewise, it’s not enough for you to know
what Christ offers. You must do
something about it.
God’s offer
of forgiveness and a new life still stands.
But tomorrow that opportunity may be gone, since, for you tomorrow may
be too late. This is the very reason
that the Bible continually challenges and warns in 2 Corinthians 6:2 that
“…now is the accepted time; behold,
now is the day of salvation.” There might not be a tomorrow to do this.
Therefore, by accepting the living Christ into your life right now you can take
that final step. You acknowledge that
you are a helpless sinner in need of the salvation that only Jesus Christ offers. Upon exercising faith or confidence in this
message of salvation you are credited God’s forgiveness, God’s eternal life,
God’s perfect righteousness and a new destiny to heaven.
The Gospel of
John tells us in the third chapter that one day Jesus was talking to people
about the
Today, many
people are like Nicodemus. They do good deeds, they carefully follow religious customs, even
Christian customs. They forget that
God’s kingdom is spiritual and the door to His kingdom is
spiritual truth. There is only one way
to enter the family of mankind, which is by being born of earthly parents. Likewise, there is only one way to enter the
family of God, which is by being born again spiritually. If we do not enter
God’s family we abide in spiritual darkness and when we die we go to the place
were sin is punished.
No one can enter
God’s presence in his once-born condition because God’s Word says, “No man can see God and live.” It requires another kind of life, God’s life,
which is eternal life. Otherwise, a
once-born person, if by some chance could get into heaven, would be like the
proverbial fish out of water. He would
not have the kind of life needed to live in God’s presence. You need God’s eternal life for His eternal
home and you become a citizen of heaven when you receive His son Jesus Christ
as Savoir. John 1:12-13 tells us that “…as many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons
of God even to them that believe on His name: 13) Which were born,
not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of
God.” This brings you into God’s family and eternal life. Without this new birth your soul will not
have the eternal life and perfect righteousness God requires.
Do
not refuse the Savior who invites you today, will you receive Him today? There might not be another tomorrow? As a result, you can have the assurance that
you are once again joined to your Creator with the right to even call Him
Father. Paul rejoiced in his
unchangeable union with the Lord and so can you when you embrace God’s incredible
message of salvation in Christ Jesus (Rom.
8:38-39).
Romans 8:38-39, “38) For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor
angels, nor principalities, nor powers,
nor things present, nor things to come, 39) Nor height, nor depth, nor any
other creature, shall be able to separate
us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus
our Lord.”
The Gift of Eternal Life
If you have never accepted Jesus Christ as your Savior,
now is your opportunity to do so.
Scripture states that Jesus died for the sins of the whole world (1John
2:2). These sins would include
not only our past, present, but all future sins that we will ever commit. God the Father placed all our sins on Jesus
Christ and judged them while He was on the cross. As a result of the Lord’s finished work (John
19:30), we do not have to endure the judgment of God for our own
personal sins, but can be “made the righteousness of God in Him.”
2Cor. 5:21, “For He [God] hath made Him [Christ] to be
sin for us [as a substitute for us], Who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.”
To benefit from the Lord’s sacrificial death on the
cross, the Bible requires you to exercise faith. This means that you must use your freewill to
accept this message of salvation. The
Bible assures you that when you exercise faith in Jesus Christ and what He
accomplished on the cross on your behalf from the love He has for you
personally, you are guaranteed eternal life.
John 3:16, “For God so loved the world, that He gave His
only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting [eternal] life.”
Therefore, wherever you may find yourself right now,
whether on the job, in your car, in your home, you are free to exercise faith
in this message for eternal life. The
Bible is clear on what the basis for our salvation is, Jesus Christ and Him
alone. He has all the merit and we
simply benefit from His meritorious work.
John 3:36, “He that believeth on the Son [Jesus Christ]
hath everlasting [eternal] life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth
on him.”
According to John 3:36, our attitude toward
Jesus Christ determines where we will spend our eternal future. Simply put, belief on the Lord’s sacrificial
death results in you having eternal life with God forever, but rejecting Him
means eternal condemnation in the
You can exercise faith in Jesus Christ by telling God the
Father that you understand that Jesus Christ is the basis for eternal life and
that you accept this gift of salvation.
Eph. 2:8-9, “8) For by grace are
ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: 9)
Not of works, lest any man should
boast.”
Please, do not neglect making this most important
decision of your life since you might not ever get another opportunity to do so
again. The decision to exercise faith in
Jesus Christ is effective while you are yet breathing. Upon physical death, this opportunity will no
longer be valid. Please do not
wait. Decide today to receive the free
gift of eternal life.
2Cor. 6:2, “For he saith, ‘I
have heard thee in a time accepted, and in the day of salvation have I succoured [helped]
thee:’ behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation.”
Conclusion
If you have made the most
important decision of your life by accepting Jesus Christ as your personal
Savior we would love to hear from you.
We have available more in depth classes and material concerning the
subject of salvation and the plan of God for your life. We also have available material on Christian
suffering, Christian love and other Bible themes. We invite you to join one of our bible
classes or visit our library. We have
Bible study material in English, Spanish and Chinese. The material available is
without charge or obligation since it is the Lord who has provided His Word in
His grace. We simply want to reflect His
grace to you. We operate completely on
voluntary contributions and if the Lord puts it in your heart to contribute to
the continuance of this ministry, then the option is
yours. If you would like a more in depth
study of salvation, you can request the booklet, “Can you be confident of going to heaven.” At the following address
or click the “BOOKLETS” link below:
Prof. Mario
Velez
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