Archives for posts with tag: John 3:16
By EvanTell, Inc.
http://www.evantell.org
The Gospel. Clear and Simple.
(The following was published on a popular Gospel tract by EvanTell, Inc.)
After years of receiving gifts that don’t fit, aren’t your style, lose their appeal or wear out, have you ever hoped for the perfect Christmas gift? A gift chosen especially for you that would fit perfectly, satisfy completely, and last forever?
Well, there is such a gift. You don’t deserve it and you cannot earn it, but you can receive it. It comes from the One who knows you best and loves you the most – God.
What is His gift?
Eternal life. You see, over 2000 years ago, God sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to be born to a virgin. He came, lived on earth for 33 years, and died that we might receive this gift which is perfectly fit to satisfy completely and last forever. The gift is there for everyone to receive.
How is it the perfect fit?
This gift is exactly what every sinner needs. It’s one-size-fits-all. Mankind has broken the laws God gave us and our sin has separated us from God. The Bible says, “For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). God is saying we have all missed the mark. We are all sinners.
Sinners can be evil people who do wicked things or good people who do good things. But whether we’re good or bad as men see us, before God we have all sinned and deserve punishment and death. The Bible is clear: “For the wages of sin is death…” (Romans 6:23). God does not want sinners to die but to live forever with Him; however, there is a price to be paid.
What’s the cost?
The price for our sin is steep – death. The good news is that the price has already been paid.
There was only one person who was qualified to rescue us from death. Jesus Christ was that person. Born of a virgin in Bethlehem, God’s perfect Son, Jesus Christ, took the punishment we deserve and died in our place. Christ spoke of His substitutionary death for us when He said, “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd gives His life for the sheep” (John 10:11).
A newspaper once printed a story about a child who disobeyed his parents by running out the front door into a busy street. He did not see the fire engine careening over the crest of the hill. A passerby did see it and flung himself into the path of the truck, pushing the little boy to safety. The passerby was killed instantly when the truck struck him. He gave his life for the child.
When Christ died, He declared, “It is finished” (John 19:30). Essentially, He was saying, “I have made things right; nothing else is needed; the price has been paid.” Three days later Christ rose from the dead to prove He had conquered both sin and the grave. God accepted His Son’s death as the complete payment for our sins. Jesus Christ was the perfect sacrifice through which the gift of eternal life can be extended. The Bible says, “…but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord (Romans 6:23).
Why would God offer such a gift?
The Bible says there is only one reason – LOVE. “For God so LOVED the world that He gave His only Son…” (John 3:16).
God wants a relationship with us even though we are all sinners. He wants us to know Him now and live with Him forever in heaven. His Son’s death in our place made that possible. No gift you ever receive on Christmas morning can come close to matching God’s gift of eternal life.
How do you receive this gift?
This gift requires one thing: belief.
You might be thinking, “Wait a minute, you keep calling eternal life a gift, I thought you had to work your way to heaven by doing all that good stuff like going to church, loving your neighbor, being baptized, keeping the commandments, and being a model citizen.”
Wrong! None of those will get you to heaven. The Bible tells us it’s free. Ephesians 2:8-9 reads, “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.”
To receive God’s gift of eternal life, you must believe. Believe means to trust and rely on, One of the clearest statements Christ said was, “He who believes in Me has everlasting life” (John 6:47). You must come to God as a sinner, recognize Jesus Christ died in your place as your substitute and rose again, and trust in Christ alone to save you.
Imagine you are in a small plane. The engines sputter and fail. You grab a parachute and put it on. As you stand in the plane’s doorway, the wind howls in your ears. You know the pack on your back can save you from death, but only if you jump. So, you place your trust in the parachute and jump. So it is the same with Christ. Trust requires that you let go of all your so-called good works and trust Him alone for your salvation. Those who are in heaven will not be there because of anything they have done – but based on a gift they received when they placed their trust in Christ alone.
God offers His gift to everyone. The label on that gift has your name on it. What will you do? Are you going to lay His gift aside or open it?
If you have never received His gift and would like to, this is how you can tell God in prayer what you are doing:
Dear God, I come to You now. I know I am a sinner. Nothing I am or do makes me deserving of heaven. I believe Jesus Christ, the One born in a manger, died for me on a cross and rose again. Right now I place my trust in Jesus Christ as my only way to heaven. Thank you for the gift of eternal life I have just received. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
Once you have trusted Christ, do two things:
First, memorize John 5:24. This verse promises that eternal life is yours right now. There we read, “He who hears My word and believes in Him who sent Me has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death unto life.”
Second, contact EvanTell.org . We will be happy to send you information concerning how you can grow as a Christian.
What is it that they say about New Year’s Resolutions — give it a week or two, and then it’s just a faint memory. By the time February rolls around, it’s as if you never attempted it in the first place. But if you try to make it your objective to, lets say, quit smoking or lose about 100 pounds — it takes a tremendous amount of discipline to stick to a goal like that and succeed by year’s end.
In 2016, I wanted to do something I always dreamed of doing but, for whatever reason, never got around to getting done — that would be reading the entire Bible, from cover-to-cover, within a one-year period. In my particular case, I was done by the Veteran’s Day holiday, so it was a little more than 10 months.
Several years ago, I remember watching Jim Bakker, who was the Pastor and Host of the former ‘PTL (Praise the Lord) Club’ TV show and subsequently went to prison on Fraud charges. After serving his sentence, Bakker became a Pastor again in the popular vacation resort community of Branson Missouri and made a rather startling statement on the interview show I saw him on.
Bakker said that until he went to Prison, he had never read the Bible from cover-to-cover. Then when he knew that he’d be in Prison for several years, along with the fact that a Bible is one of the few things they allow an inmate to have, Bakker felt it was a great opportunity for him to finally read the entire Bible, from cover-to-cover.
Call me gullible and naive if you will, but I always assumed that reading the entire Bible, from cover-to-cover was just a basic prerequisite to graduating from any reputable Minister’s college. I mean, if you love God, you should love His Word — right? People who choose to devote their lives to “Preaching the Gospel” ought to take the time to, at least, read and study the Holy Bible forwards, backwards, and sideways so it becomes a part of their every living fiber and their absolute deepest thoughts.
Truth be told, I think there are more ordained Ministers in the world like Jim Bakker — BEFORE he went to Prison — when it comes to having the discipline to read thru the entire Bible, even once, from cover-to-cover. Granted, I think most Ministers are very familiar with the vast majority of the Bible and have ample resources to locate a scripture within seconds, but in all fairness, the Bible does have some very intimidating sections.
For example, when the Bible gets into the bloodline (or the Genealogy) from Adam to Jesus Christ, you’ve got a ton of names there — a lot of whom have no second mentions. Are “good Christians” expected to memorize all these names and people? Although I sort of think I’m in good company on this issue because it seems like every time I watch the popular TV cartoon show, The Simpsons, they have Rev. Lovejoy preaching a sermon on some portion of the genealogy cited in the Bible, and then they turn the cameras and we see both Homer and Bart sound asleep in their seats. I don’t mean to sound disrespectful, but I think the topic of genealogy is just a tough thing for most people to fully comprehend and understand.
And what about all the specific measurements God wanted for the building of Noah’s Ark? Or how about the exact size of a sacrificial altar? Or what are the specifics on how you select and then prepare an animal as a holy burnt offering?
God is very detailed oriented, there’s no doubt about it. I also acknowledge the fact that there are a handful of individuals among us now who could easily memorize the aforementioned Bible scriptures, at least, as well as a lot of folks can memorize baseball or football statistics. I just hope and pray that I’m not held accountable on Judgement Day for not being able to memorize all those particular details. Praise God too that all those hard-to-comprehend details only make up a very small portion of the Bible.
Another thing worth noting here is that I went through an Internet site called, Biblica that offers a Plan it refers to as, The Bible in 365 Days. It not only divided the Bible into 365 parts with approximately 3-4 chapters per day, it also divided the Bible into three different sections: New Testament, Poetry (Psalms and Proverbs), and Old Testament (minus Psalms and Proverbs). Breaking up the Bible that way does make it a little more interesting to read and study, I feel. The listed scriptures for that particular day usually start at a natural starting point, and finishes at a natural ending point. I noticed too that there are a few other websites, and even some books, that offer similar type Bible-in-a-Year plans other than Biblica.
Personally, the only way I think I could’ve read the entire Bible, cover-to-cover, without the aid of the Internet or some type of prescribed Plan would be if I was in Prison like, Pastor Jim Bakker and I had a lot of free time on my hands.
So I guess that just leaves the question as to “why” anybody would want to read the Bible within a year or make it one of their, New Year’s Resolutions — there is a verse of scripture that states, “study to show thyself approved unto God”. So for starters, I’d love to be “approved” by God; I sort of think everybody would. Also, if we Christians accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior in our lives, doesn’t it just make sense that we try to learn as much as we possibly can about “the One” who made this all possible?
There’s another verse of scripture — also in the New Testament — which states that it’s God’s Will for our lives to, “be Saved and come to the knowledge of the Truth.” Now becoming “Saved” or “Born Again” is fairly easy — just read Romans 10:9-10 and ask Jesus Christ to be Lord and Savior in your life. The real “tough part” for a person actually wanting to be Saved — are they willing to Repent and Give Up their Sins in order to make Jesus Christ as the absolute Role Model and Standard-Bearer of their life? The second part of the aforementioned scripture, “come to the knowledge of the Truth” — well that’s truly a lifetime commitment and something even the best of Christians may never fully attain, at least here on Earth.
Prior to my 2016 New Year’s Resolution, I was fairly content with just memorizing a couple dozen scriptures that were fitting for either a tee shirt or bumper sticker — like, for example, John 3:16 — For God so loved the world that he gave His only begotten son that whom ever believed in him should not perish but have Everlasting Life. Now don’t get me wrong, that’s a beautiful verse of scripture which sort of requires hours, if not years of contemplation to try to fully capture the entire scope of its meaning. On the flip-side of that, for a Christian to just be content memorizing a couple dozen “Biggie” verses of scripture is sort of like saying you’ve got a great understanding of God because you took the time to read thru the Cliff Notes publication on the Bible.
There just has to be a lot more to God and Jesus Christ than a very condensed Cliff Notes publication on the Bible, along with a couple dozen “tremendous” verses of scripture that would look great on a vehicle’s bumper sticker. I want to know specifically, what other “hidden gems” does God have for our learning, understanding, and benefit elsewhere in the Bible? What popular cliches do we use in our everyday language that originally derived from God’s Word? Hence the need and desire for me to read and study the entire Bible, from cover-to-cover.
I don’t view myself as a better human being now that I’ve read the entire Bible, cover-to-cover, but I do think it’s a step in the right direction. Actual application — or the active practical “doing” of the Bible — is probably deemed a higher priority or a little more important in God’s eyes, than simple Bible verse memorization. Maybe 2-3 years from now, I may revisit one of these Internet plans and read over the New Testament or the Old Testament within a couple months just to try to keep myself sharp. On many different levels, I still view myself as, God’s Work in Progress, as opposed to being the person I really want to be or maybe becoming the person God wants me to be.
I guess I’ll just keep praying that I’ll eventually wind up where God really wants me to be.
One Bad Decision Away From Homelessness 