Faith in the News Christian News
There are some truths in the Bible we cannot compromise on, and here are 5 essential truths we must hold onto.
The Spotless Lamb
I was once asked, “Why didn’t Jesus just come down to earth and die on the cross, instead of having to live for 33 years and suffer so much?” I said, “God could have done whatever God wanted to do, since He is God, but Jesus came to live a life of perfection for us, and to live it in the flesh.” In doing so, Jesus’ life and death would satisfy the wrath of God so that it would not be placed on us. By willingly giving His life as a ransom for many (Mark 10:45), he was able to reconcile us back to God. If Jesus had sinned even once, the spotless Lamb of God would be spotless no more and that’s a huge problem because God demanded a perfect atoning sacrifice. Of course, Jesus never sinned, and by His sinless life of perfection, we can have His perfection attributed to us (2nd Cor 5:21) so that we can stand in the presence of God on the Day of Judgment and be seen as having Jesus’ very own righteousness. There is no other way to be saved than by the spotless Lamb of God. It is not negotiable, because we “were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot” (1st Pet 18-19).
Born in the Flesh
Jesus had no earthly father, thereby avoiding the “sin gene” passed on through Adam (1st Cor 15). Jesus’ Father was God the Father, as Jesus was begotten by the Holy Spirit in the virgin Mary. He would now become both Man and God, but He never ceased being God. We know that Jesus is God and has always been God, and it has always been that way, since “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” (John 1:1). It was through Jesus’ birth by the virgin Mary that “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14). The Apostle John indicates that you must believe Jesus came in the flesh, so “By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God” (1st John 4:2). John emphasizes this because it’s essential to believe that Jesus was both God and Man. It’s essential because “many deceivers have gone out into the world, those who do not confess the coming of Jesus Christ in the flesh. Such a one is the deceiver and the antichrist” (2nd John 1:7).
The Sinfulness of Humanity
We were once separated from God by our sins, just as the Prophet Isaiah wrote, “your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear” (Isaiah 59:2). The idea that good people should go to heaven is not found in the Bible because not even one of us are good; we’ve all turned aside and because useless to God, and in fact, we don’t even seek after God (Rom 3:10-12). Every person ever born (except Christ’s physical birth) has sinned or those yet to be born will sin. It’s in our nature, but even though we still sin, we should be sinning less over time, but the truth is, before we trusted in Christ, we were infinitely short of God’s glory (Rom 3:23). Before we were saved, we were dead in our sins and needed quickening by God’s Spirit (Eph 2:1-5), so if we think we’re good enough or could do enough good things to enter heaven, why would Jesus have had to suffer and die?
Jesus is God
If Jesus died for our sins but He was only a man and not God, then we’re still dead in our sins and without hope. God demands a sacrifice to redeem us but a sacrifice that we could never provide, so God demands a sacrifice but God becomes the sacrifice. Since Jesus is God, and God came to be born into the flesh, He could become a sacrifice that is acceptable to God because Jesus is God. Tragically, there are a number of cults, and now, tragically, some seminaries, that teach Jesus became God and in some false churches, people can become God, although there is absolutely no evidence for this. Jesus is the Alpha and Omega, and in the Greek alphabet, that means, “He’s everything…A to Z” and in between. He is all and in all and Creator of all (John 1:2-3). We know that Jesus has always existed, and most certainly prior to His earthly ministry. We know that because He once told the Jews, “Before Abraham was (or existed), I AM” (John 8:48), and Jesus’ seven “I AM” statements in the Gospel of John reveal the covenantal name of God that the Jews referred to Him by, and it is the “I AM that I AM” or the self-existing One (Ex 3:14).
The Resurrection
The Apostle Paul writes that if Christ is not risen, then we are still dead in our sins and without hope of eternal life, and wrote, “if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain” (1st Cor 14:14), and “if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied” (1st Cor 15:16-19). Thankfully, we can in fact state with authority that “Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep” (1st Cor 15:20), and since Christ has been raised from the dead, He will also raise our mortal bodies after death and we shall forever be in the presence of the Lord (Rev 21:3; 22:4), just as He did Lazarus who was four-days-dead!
Conclusion
There are certainly more than five essential truths we must never let go of, but there are no less than these five, and they include the sinless-ness of Christ; the fact that Jesus was both Man and God, being born into the flesh; that human beings cannot save themselves so their salvation must come from outside of themselves; that Jesus is God and provides a God-sized sacrifice adequate to save all who repent and believe (Mark 1:14-15); and that just as He was raised, we too will be raised someday because Jesus has resurrection power in His Word (John 11:25-26).
May God richly bless you
Pastor Jack Wellman
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