GOSPEL LIGHT #735

Personal Relationship with Jesus Misconception 

It has become common nowadays to encourage people to have "a personal relationship with Jesus." When I was in my 20s what they usually and commonly mean by this is that one now has to start doing the following:|

Pray to Him directly, not just recite formal prayers. Read the Bible as His Word to them and not just a mere literature. Submission to His authority not as a mere obligation. Viewing Him as living  and present and not just as a historical figure.  

Practically, to them, one becomes a Christian when one starts to sincerely live the Christian life. This is essentially salvation by works dressed up in personal-relationship-with-Jesus language! How is this different in principle to just obey and live the Ten Commandments to become a Christian? 

We all have a relationship with God whether we like it or not. Either one is an enemy of God or one who is reconciled to Him. We all start out as enemies of God. And the only way to be reconciled and have peace with Him is through the death of the Lord Jesus Christ for our sins. The moment we put our trust in what He did on the cross is the very moment when have a blessed relationship with Him.

 RO 5:1 Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,

RO 5:8 But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. 

RO 5:9 Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him. 

RO 5:10 For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. 

RO 5:11 And not only this, but we also exult in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation.

GOSPEL LIGHT #784

Theresa Made It Easy and So Did God

I was once at a birthday celebration when something caught my attention. It made me "write home" so to speak. It gave me a gospel light to write about. 

In the middle of the party, the family decided to play a voice recognition game. The birthday celebrant was made to turn away from the crowd. One by one, people approached her from behind and greeted her. Her task was to correctly identify each person just by their voice.

Some people deliberately changed their voices, just to make the game a bit more difficult. Then came Theresa. Unlike the others, she spoke plainly and naturally, her voice distinct and unmistakable. The celebrant caught her voice and the prize was hers!

This is a beautiful illustration of how God made salvation accessible, uncomplicated and straightforward for us. He made faith in Christ as the condition of salvation! In His goodness and kindness to us, He made the condition of salvation very, very, very simple. 

Just like the celebrant didn’t have to struggle to recognize Theresa’s voice, we don’t have to figure out complicated requirements to receive salvation. Simply trust in Christ and what He did on the cross for you and you will be saved! 

GOSPEL LIGHT #783

 Why Unconditional Forgiveness Harms the Gospel Message

LEV 16:15 “Then he shall slaughter the goat of the sin offering which is for the people, and bring its blood inside the veil and do with its blood as he did with the blood of the bull, and sprinkle it on the mercy seat and in front of the mercy seat.

LEV 16:21 “Then Aaron shall lay both of his hands on the head of the live goat, and confess over it all the iniquities of the sons of Israel and all their transgressions in regard to all their sins; and he shall lay them on the head of the goat and send it away into the wilderness by the hand of a man who stands in readiness.

Take note of that expression in verse 21 "send it away" for this is really the idea of forgiveness.

Forgiveness means to dismiss and send away. This is illustrated in the Old Testament by the scapegoat released into the wilderness symbolically carrying the sins of the people. Look at that goat - it's dismissed and sent away! But notice please that before the scapegoat could be released, another goat had to be sacrificed first as a sin offering. Sin offering first, scapegoat second.

The sequence is crucial --- atonement comes first, then forgiveness becomes possible.

Teaching forgiveness as unconditional ignores this essential sequence and effectively bypasses the sacrifice required for the dismissal and sending away of sin. IT MAKES CHRIST'S ATONEMENT UNNCESSARY!

To make all this simple - forgiveness of sins is only possible because of the atonement. Make use of God's quote unquote "goat" on the cross of Calvary. Put your confidence in His sacrifice then and only then can you believe all you want that your sins are forgiven.

GOSPEL LIGHT #782

Doing Christian things and activities, even sincerely, doesn’t make you a Christian.

It’s like an actor who feels so deeply that he is a firefighter, shedding tears, living in the role in his own heart, yet he is still not really a firefighter.

Or take Don Quixote, the character created by Miguel de Cervantes, who truly believes he is a brave knight, dressing in makeshift armor, riding an old horse, and charging at windmills he imagines are giants, convinced he is protecting the helpless and fighting evil, yet in reality, he is still just an ordinary man and not a knight. Or take someone who is immersed in a virtual reality game, fully convinced they are accomplishing great feats, solving challenges, and saving worlds with all their heart and focus, yet it’s all happening in a headset.

Again, doing Christian things and activities, even sincerely, doesn’t make you a Christian. You may be like the actor; sincere in feeling he is a firefighter, but it is merely conceptual. Or like Don Quixote; truly believing he is a knight, yet the whole thing was delusional. Or like someone immersed in a virtual reality game; convinced they are accomplishing great feats, yet it is only virtual. Sincerity alone doesn’t make it real.

Sadly, many people are Christians conceptually, delusionally and virtually but not in reality, as if dreaming realistically of salvation only to awaken in hell. Lots of people are living a realistic dream that they are Christians. 

First things first - all your sins must be paid for. Doing Christian things sincerely, no matter how intense or heartfelt, does nothing to deal with your sins past, present or future. No matter how sincerely you do Christian activities, it cannot erase your guilt. A real Christian is, first of all, saved from the penalty of sin. And this can only happen if you put your confidence in Christ and what He did on the cross for your salvation. 

GOSPEL LIGHT #781

 Priest Offers Himself Without Sacrifice - Gets Burned 

JERUSALEM - In an unprecedented display of devotion, priest Yakov Eliab reportedly gave  and offered himself fully to God in the temple yesterday showing up empty-handed, without any sacrifice whatsoever. 

Eyewitnesses say Eliab entered the Holiest part of the temple, arms raised, and shouted, “Lord, take me! I am yours!”

In an instant, Eliab was engulfed in fire. When the smoke cleared, nothing remained of him - not a hair, not a robe, even his very shadow was burned. From somewhere inside the flames, a tiny, singed voice called out: “Okay! Okay! Next time… I’ll just bring a lamb!” Then there was only silence. 

Temple scribes shook their heads and muttered, “We told him not to do it but he insisted that giving himself should count for something.”

In the meantime, another figure stood at the doorway of the temple, positioned himself, and ready to pray the sinner’s prayer inside, without a sacrifice. He will not be bring any sacrifice at all but will just say inside that he will accept the lamb in his heart.

GOSPEL LIGHT #780

 The "Give Your Life to Christ" Theology

In the book of Romans starting from chapter 1 all the way to chapter 5:21, where Paul talks about justification, he never talks about giving our lives to Christ.

In the gospel of John, the NT gospel "tract", John never employed the idea of giving our life to Christ for salvation. On the contrary, he says "as many as received Him." Over and over again, he conditions salvation on believing or trusting in Christ. Trusting in Him is receiving His claims.

The giving of our life to Christ is not a fitting response to the gospel message. The gospel message is "Christ died for our sins and was raised again." Either you trust in it or not. These are your only options.

If you give your life to Christ He will only crucify it in Himself on the cross. It can only produce filthy rags. It's the resurrected life that He wants not your pre-cross life.

What we need first and foremost is the atonement and payment for our sins. Our lives could never do it. Atonement is only in His blood. Trust in it.

It's not our surrender, the giving of our lives to Him - that saves. It is His surrender, His giving of His life, that saves.

We never give ourselves to Him perfectly. When we sin, we are practically taking it back. Even if we give our lives to Him perfectly from this point on, we already fell short yesterday and all the yesterdays before that. If you want to be saved through that route -- He wants perfection.

Giving our life to Him is sanctification not justification.

Giving our life to Him is practically salvation by works. If the giving of our lives is the condition of salvation then why did Christ die on the cross? Why did He give His life when we only have to give our own? In the Old Testament, the sacrificial system vividly showed that atonement required a substitute. The sinner had to bring an animal offering; offering oneself would never do. What this symbolically revealed is how a sinner is saved: through the death of a substitute, not by offering oneself. Your own self cannot atone for your sins -don’t try to give it; it needs a substitute.

You can give your self to God but if you don't get inside the Ark, the Flood would devour you.

You can give your self to God but if you don't look at the bronze serpent, you will die.

The only response that made sense when Abraham was promised by God in Genesis 15 was faith. Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him for righteousness. Giving himself to God at this point would not make sense. Don't give your life. Receive eternal life.

GOSPEL LIGHT #779

 

GE 39:22 The chief jailer committed to Joseph’s charge all the prisoners who were in the jail; so that whatever was done there, he was responsible for it.

GE 39:23 The chief jailer did not supervise anything under Joseph’s charge because the LORD was with him; and whatever he did, the LORD made to prosper.


You see, because Joseph was there, even prison became a place of blessing.

To be sure, many were in that prison, but it was only when Joseph came that it became a favored and prosperous place.

In the same, many were crucified on the cross of Calvary. The cross was the emblem of shame, cruelty and condemnation. But when the Lord Jesus Christ was nailed to the cross, He transformed it forever.

Because He was there, what was once a place of death became the doorway to life. What was once a place of condemnation became the fountain of salvation.

And today, through that same cross, sinners can be forgiven, the guilty can be justified, and the broken made whole.

You know, where Jesus is - everything changes.

Will you come to Him putting your confidence in what He did on the cross for you?