Articles by: Kenneth J. Ester
There is a reason Jesus died for us.
God created man to have an eternal relationship with us, but to have that relationship with us, He needed to give us free will. Without free will, we would not be able to make any choices of our own. We could not choose what food we liked the most, what we found funny, who to spend time with or anything. We would essentially be nothing more than a doll in a child's hands. The only difference is that God is not a child and we would be alive.
Can a child have a relationship with a Barbie doll? Of course not. She could play with the dolls all she wants but to have a relationship it must come from both sides. Inanimate things are incapable of having a relationship. So the only way God could truly have a relationship with us was if He gave us free will, so we could make decisions for ourselves.
With that free will, we also had the ability to choose sin over God. When Adam sinned, it did more than upset the Lord. It corrupted his soul. Sin is like a spiritual cancer. It corrupts anything it touches and it never heals on its own. God on the other hand is perfect. He is pure and holy! He is so pure and holy that sin cannot even exist in His presence when He is in His full glory.
What a lot of people don't understand is that whenever God reveals Himself to people, it is a dialed back version. When Moses saw God on the mountain in the burning bush, he asked the Lord to show him His glory. God replied that man cannot see His face and survive. You see, if anyone with a corrupted soul was to enter heaven where God abides in His full glory, His holiness would literally destroy that person's soul. God would not destroy those He loves, so mankind was blocked from entering heaven.
That is why we need salvation. Because only through salvation can our souls be washed clean so we can enter the presence of the Lord in heaven without being destroyed.
God had a plan to save us though. To fully understand this, it is important to know that God is not just a single spirit. God is a triune God. There are three parts to God. There is God the Father, God the Word, and God the Holy Spirit. It is God the Word that everything is created through. So with mankind blocked from entering heaven, there was only one other option for us in the end. The Lake of Fire. The place God created to punish the devil and his angels who followed him for all eternity.
Who are we to think that if we reject God, we deserve better than what the fallen angels will get? They rejected Him the same way. Through free will. They used free will to choose to follow Lucifer over staying with God, so they will receive an eternity of punishment in the lake of fire for it. And so will ever human who does the same.
Yet there are many who choose God. Why should they be punished just because of they are not perfect and make mistakes? They shouldn't, but God simply cannot let them into heaven because then they would be destroyed.
Something even most Christians do not fully understand, is that God has been forgiving sin all along. The Old Testament is filled with scriptures of God demanding His people to sacrifice animals to atone for their sins. That is what allows God to forgive us for sin. Atonement. Atonement is the action one makes to right a wrong, in hopes of forgiveness. Atonement can only be made through blood. God set this precedent from the beginning when Adam sinned and the Lord sacrificed an animal and used its hide to make clothes for them to cover their nakedness. The problem however is that no animal could ever be pure or holy enough to wash our souls clean. Forgiveness is an choice. God forgave their sins when they sacrificed animals. But that sacrifice did not cleanse their souls.
So God the Word came to earth and took on flesh. He was born fully human and was named Jesus. When He was born in the flesh through a woman without a human father, Jesus literally became the only begotten Son of God. He lived a perfect life and never sinned. Then when they came to take him, and His disciples tried to fight to protect Him, He stopped them. Why? Because He chose to go with them quietly knowing He would die. This action changed Him from being taken and killed like a martyr, to a man willingly going and sacrificing Himself for us.
When Jesus died on the cross, the blood He shed was pure and holy. His sacrifice was so pure and holy, it was enough to wash all of our souls clean. After all, He was not just a man, but He was God in the flesh.
His sacrifice however, does not automatically cleanse everyone's souls. God is not going to save those who reject Him. He gave us free will and will allow us to use it, even to our own demise. He will not force our hands. So he now offers salvation (the washing of our souls) as a free gift to anyone who will accept it.
Our souls are not physical things however. They are spiritual things. So the cleansing of our soul is a spiritual gift. The only way anyone can possibly accept a spiritual gift is to believe with all their heart it is real. For if you do not believe it is real, how can you accept it?
That is all there is to salvation. No jumping through hoops. No following rules or earning your stripes. Just believing it is real. To be saved you must believe in the following things....
1) Jesus is the only begotten Son of God.
2) Jesus willingly gave His life on the cross for us.
3) God raised Jesus from the dead.
4) That Jesus is Lord and Savior.
You must believe those four things in your heart, enough that you are willing to state it to someone else that Jesus is Lord. If you are too ashamed to say Jesus is Lord (and mean it) then He will be ashamed of you when you face judgment.
That is all it is. Believing those things are true. Jesus said very clearly...
John 3:18 (KJV)
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.
Many teach that there is more to salvation. That works is involved. Believe me this is not true. What I have told you here is all the truth according to God's Word. They confuse our relationship with the Lord, with Salvation. First we must be saved by believing. After we believe, everything after that is about growing in our relationship with Him. But you cannot have a relationship with the Lord if you do not first believe He is Lord.
There is a reason Jesus died for us. He died to save us from eternal damnation. He died for us so He could have the relationship with us that sin took away. A relationship in this life to be sure, but more importantly. A relationship that will last forever.
Can a child have a relationship with a Barbie doll? Of course not. She could play with the dolls all she wants but to have a relationship it must come from both sides. Inanimate things are incapable of having a relationship. So the only way God could truly have a relationship with us was if He gave us free will, so we could make decisions for ourselves.
With that free will, we also had the ability to choose sin over God. When Adam sinned, it did more than upset the Lord. It corrupted his soul. Sin is like a spiritual cancer. It corrupts anything it touches and it never heals on its own. God on the other hand is perfect. He is pure and holy! He is so pure and holy that sin cannot even exist in His presence when He is in His full glory.
What a lot of people don't understand is that whenever God reveals Himself to people, it is a dialed back version. When Moses saw God on the mountain in the burning bush, he asked the Lord to show him His glory. God replied that man cannot see His face and survive. You see, if anyone with a corrupted soul was to enter heaven where God abides in His full glory, His holiness would literally destroy that person's soul. God would not destroy those He loves, so mankind was blocked from entering heaven.
That is why we need salvation. Because only through salvation can our souls be washed clean so we can enter the presence of the Lord in heaven without being destroyed.
God had a plan to save us though. To fully understand this, it is important to know that God is not just a single spirit. God is a triune God. There are three parts to God. There is God the Father, God the Word, and God the Holy Spirit. It is God the Word that everything is created through. So with mankind blocked from entering heaven, there was only one other option for us in the end. The Lake of Fire. The place God created to punish the devil and his angels who followed him for all eternity.
Who are we to think that if we reject God, we deserve better than what the fallen angels will get? They rejected Him the same way. Through free will. They used free will to choose to follow Lucifer over staying with God, so they will receive an eternity of punishment in the lake of fire for it. And so will ever human who does the same.
Yet there are many who choose God. Why should they be punished just because of they are not perfect and make mistakes? They shouldn't, but God simply cannot let them into heaven because then they would be destroyed.
Something even most Christians do not fully understand, is that God has been forgiving sin all along. The Old Testament is filled with scriptures of God demanding His people to sacrifice animals to atone for their sins. That is what allows God to forgive us for sin. Atonement. Atonement is the action one makes to right a wrong, in hopes of forgiveness. Atonement can only be made through blood. God set this precedent from the beginning when Adam sinned and the Lord sacrificed an animal and used its hide to make clothes for them to cover their nakedness. The problem however is that no animal could ever be pure or holy enough to wash our souls clean. Forgiveness is an choice. God forgave their sins when they sacrificed animals. But that sacrifice did not cleanse their souls.
So God the Word came to earth and took on flesh. He was born fully human and was named Jesus. When He was born in the flesh through a woman without a human father, Jesus literally became the only begotten Son of God. He lived a perfect life and never sinned. Then when they came to take him, and His disciples tried to fight to protect Him, He stopped them. Why? Because He chose to go with them quietly knowing He would die. This action changed Him from being taken and killed like a martyr, to a man willingly going and sacrificing Himself for us.
When Jesus died on the cross, the blood He shed was pure and holy. His sacrifice was so pure and holy, it was enough to wash all of our souls clean. After all, He was not just a man, but He was God in the flesh.
His sacrifice however, does not automatically cleanse everyone's souls. God is not going to save those who reject Him. He gave us free will and will allow us to use it, even to our own demise. He will not force our hands. So he now offers salvation (the washing of our souls) as a free gift to anyone who will accept it.
Our souls are not physical things however. They are spiritual things. So the cleansing of our soul is a spiritual gift. The only way anyone can possibly accept a spiritual gift is to believe with all their heart it is real. For if you do not believe it is real, how can you accept it?
That is all there is to salvation. No jumping through hoops. No following rules or earning your stripes. Just believing it is real. To be saved you must believe in the following things....
1) Jesus is the only begotten Son of God.
2) Jesus willingly gave His life on the cross for us.
3) God raised Jesus from the dead.
4) That Jesus is Lord and Savior.
You must believe those four things in your heart, enough that you are willing to state it to someone else that Jesus is Lord. If you are too ashamed to say Jesus is Lord (and mean it) then He will be ashamed of you when you face judgment.
That is all it is. Believing those things are true. Jesus said very clearly...
John 3:18 (KJV)
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.
Many teach that there is more to salvation. That works is involved. Believe me this is not true. What I have told you here is all the truth according to God's Word. They confuse our relationship with the Lord, with Salvation. First we must be saved by believing. After we believe, everything after that is about growing in our relationship with Him. But you cannot have a relationship with the Lord if you do not first believe He is Lord.
There is a reason Jesus died for us. He died to save us from eternal damnation. He died for us so He could have the relationship with us that sin took away. A relationship in this life to be sure, but more importantly. A relationship that will last forever.