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NOW IS NOT TOO LATE. TOMORROW MAY BE. …"Don't you fear God," he said, "since you are under the
same sentence?" Luke 23:40 All verses quoted from the New International Version Bible (NIV) INTRODUCTION Mother Teresa and Princess Diana. They tried to do good. One certainly gave her
all for others. Within a week they both fell to the great common denominator.
Death. We will all taste it, soon, alas, life is fleeting. For many of us it
will occur suddenly as it did with Diana. Old age may never come. Where are they now? Where will you be? NOT, where would you like to be?
But...where will you be? We are looking at things wrong. We are not in the land of the living
looking at our death in the future. We are in the land of the dying, needing
to see our place in life after death. Check the obituaries, people younger
than each of us have died today. We plan for old age. Many of us we will not
see it. It could be you. WE ARE ON THE FAST TRACK TO DEATH. CAN YOU AVOID IT? Who will listen? Jeremiah 6: 10 To whom can I speak and give warning? Who will listen
to me? Their ears are closed so they cannot hear. The word of the LORD is
offensive to them; they find no pleasure in it. …13 "From the least to
the greatest, all are greedy for gain; prophets and priests alike, all
practice deceit. 14 They dress the wound of my people as though it were not
serious. `Peace, peace,' they say, when there is no peace. 15 Are they
ashamed of their loathsome conduct? No, they have no shame at all; they do
not even know how to blush. So they will fall among the fallen; they will be
brought down when I punish them," says the LORD. 16 This is what the
LORD says: "Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths,
ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your
souls. But you said, `We will not walk in it.' 17 I appointed watchmen over
you and said, ` Listen to the sound of the trumpet!' But you said, `We will
not listen .' 18 Therefore hear,
O nations; observe, O witnesses, what will happen to them. 19 Hear, O earth:
I am bringing disaster on this people, the fruit of their schemes, because
they have not listened to my words and have rejected my law. The above scripture written by the prophet Jeremiah is as true as it
was in the past. Will you listen? Is it too late? 1 John 3:1 How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that
we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the
world does not know us is that it did not know him. Do we really know Him? Especially today each of us feel that ‘I am
not as bad as others’ and that a fair God would not condemn me. Is this our
thinking or God’s? We have the Ten Commandments and the Law whose purpose
includes convincing ourselves we have sinned against God. Who of us can say
we have not violated the commandment "remember the Sabbath day and keep it
Holy". We each have failed to keep these famous ten commandments.
(Exodus 20) By failing at just one of the commandments God says we are guilty
of them all. James 2:10 For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just
one point is guilty of breaking all of it. Just one 'little' sin can exclude us from God's presence for
eternity. God demands perfection and none of us can achieve it.
Only through Christ's blood can we have a relationship with God. For
example, suppose you and 2 other individuals decided to swim from Los Angeles
to Hawaii. Suppose one of the swimmers was the absolute best swimmer in
the world. One may make it a few miles, you may make it some distance
short of the target and the best swimmer may make it quite a bit further but still
nowhere close to the target. That is like God. With sin, we cannot approach God, no matter how
'good' we are. Christ cleanses us from sin and we make it to the
target, eternal life in Heaven. We must ask forgiveness. Thomas Jefferson wrote in 1781: God who gave us life gave us liberty. And can
the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only
firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are
of the Gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with His
wrath? Indeed, I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just that
His justice cannot sleep forever. Isaiah 53: 6 We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us
has turned to his own way;… Warning. Consider God. His judgement is coming. What will happen to you after death? We each need to be certain of our
place in the afterlife above all else we do. We all know life is relatively
short with no guarantee of tomorrow. If God does exist, we need to know Him
as well as we can. Are there a Heaven and a Hell? Is there a GOD? Christ
said: Luke 12: 5 But I will show you whom you should fear: Fear him who,
after the killing of the body, has power to throw you into hell
. Yes, I tell you, fear him. These are the most important questions we are required to answer. If
Hell exists then we must avoid it with all uncertainty or be in eternal
torment. The Holy Bible (New International Version) has 14 verses referring
to hell (12 by Christ). It is real. Forty-six verses (14 by Christ) mention
the name of Satan and 32 deals with the devil. Satan and his dwelling are
real. Christ warns of the pending punishment for the ungodly: Matthew 24: 51 He will cut him to pieces and assign him a place with
the hypocrites, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. We consider ourselves a "Christian" nation. Why is there so
much unrest and evil in our society? What will fix it? George Washington wrote in his 1789 Inaugural address: The propitious smiles of Heaven can never be
expected on a nation that disregards the eternal
rules of order and right which Heaven itself has ordained. There are so many religions and so many views of God. Who can be sure
they are following the right god? Does it matter? Aren’t they all the same? The purpose of this is to help clarify our thinking on this subject.
View this critically and somberly. Ask yourself – Am I going to heaven? What if I’m wrong? How
can I be certain? Your place in eternity depends on it. This is put together as a witness for Jesus Christ who cares for
you. Just imagine, suppose Princess Diana did not make it to
heaven and actually went to hell? What a tragedy. What
confidence do we have that she is in heaven? More importantly, what confidence
did she have? Was it grounded on truth or guessing? I do not know where
she is. That is up to God. What is infinitely more important to
you is How is your relationship with the Almighty God?
Who can imagine her eternally in horrible torment? As much as we loved
her, it certainly is possible. It is important that we are confident
in our disposition – according to God’s Word. We cannot make up our own
rules for we are only a small part of the creation, not the creator Himself. Job 28:28 And he said to man, `The fear of the Lord--that is wisdom , and to shun evil is understanding.'" John 3:16 "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and
only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal
life. 17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world , but to save the world through him. 18 Whoever
believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands
condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God's one and
only Son. 19 This is the verdict: Light has come
into the world , but men loved darkness instead of
light because their deeds were evil. 20 Everyone who does evil
hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds
will be exposed. 21 But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so
that it may be seen plainly that what he has done has been done through
God." IS THERE A GOD? This is a question that should not even be asked. Even the most
primitive civilizations since the beginning of time have known there is a Creator.
Due to the level of today’s deception of self-righteousness and inflated
beliefs of our ability, the question has some merit. The question is
central to our existence. Either God made everything (including
directing it/allowing it to happen), or He didn’t. It is all or none. Ecclesiastes 3:10 I have seen the burden God has laid on men. 11 He
has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the
hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to
end. Stephen Hawking, the theoretical physicist who wrote in his book A
Brief History of Time said "It
would be very difficult to explain why the universe should have begun in just
this way, except as the act of a God who intended to create beings like
us" (p 127). Despite this, I understand he doesn’t believe
in God! We go out of our way to deny the patently obvious. This
is true even for the most intelligent individuals. You may be surprised the current evolution/creation controversy was
predicted with incredible clarity in the Bible. Romans 1:18 The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against
all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their
wickedness, 19 since what may be known about God is plain to them, because
God has made it plain to them. 20 For since the creation of the world God's
invisible qualities--his eternal power and divine nature--have been clearly
seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without
excuse. 21 For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor
gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts
were darkened. 22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools According to that, we have no excuse! Simply by experiencing some
of God’’s creation, it is patently obvious that God
does exist. To deny that is the pinnacle of foolishness. God
warned we would deny His creation in those verses. Further, God’s
wrath is coming. Consider how we have developed science to the level it is today.
Scientific thinking began as a means to understand our world and our
existence. Many of the earliest scientists were, like we are, trying to
understand God. Western civilization was largely advanced by objective
Christian thought processes. This was instrumental in advancing our
knowledge to where we are today. We can begin to know the mind of God
through learning about those things He has made. He has shown His mind
has an incredible degree of organization and complexity, much of which we
cannot comprehend. We think we are rather smart. We can play around with DNA and
manipulate genes and do some pretty incredible stuff but still, WE HAVE NEVER
MADE LIFE. The only reason we have been able to understand DNA is that
(thankfully) God gave us brains enough to figure it out. Who could make
a person as incredible as you, out of simply 4 base pairs (of DNA). Four base pairs form hands, fingernails, eyes,
stomach, brain and all other systems as well as other organisms!!!!! Further,
genes are extremely accurate. We have overwhelming evidence someone
greater than ourselves made us. Why should we believe life began simply by chance over millions of
years? If life formed by chance and we are intelligent, why can’t we
make life after we already know so much about it? We have the cookbook and
still we can’t do it!!! By chance??? Astronomically
impossible. How can we be so misled? Look at a leaf. Can it be formed by chance? Evolutionists
think so. Really. Get a leaf and carefully look at its color,
texture, structure and vein system. Consider where it grew from and how
dirt, gases, water and a tiny seed could make a tree. Consider how beautiful
our world is with mountains, oceans, flowers, birds, fish and other plants,
animals and humans. Consider how complex each living thing is.
Consider how each living thing is beautiful on the outside and inside and how
these microscopically maintain incredible order. The building blocks are
incredibly simple, well organized and beautiful in their own right but the
finished product is incredibly complex and likewise beautiful, such as atoms,
molecules, tissues and even atomic particles!. Years ago an early scientist (Francisco Redi)
was battling the idea of spontaneous neogenesis of
life forms believed to be fact at that time. People had observed the
presence of maggots on decaying meat and had decided the meat was
spontaneously forming the maggots as it decayed. Redi
claimed that was not the case. He placed fine mesh cheesecloth over one
piece of decaying meat in a container and left another uncovered. He
then discovered the flies eating the uncovered meat and, days later, maggots
were there. The other piece of decaying meat had no maggots, of course.
Did we learn from his experiment? Yes and no. We all know
that spontaneous neogenesis was disproven.
Why are we trying to implicate this with evolution today? Didn’t we
already prove it doesn’t work that way? That experiment proved that
life forms only from life. We have not been able to disprove this
overwhelming truth. The primordial soup of precursor elements being
espoused today could not have had better building blocks than that
found in decaying meat consisting of protein, fats and some carbohydrates. I know we remain asking where did God come from?
I would much rather trust that one greater than I made this world than
guessing that all life happened just by chance. At least in Redi’s time people were seeing meat as containing
building blocks for life. Today some indicate fractals and chaos as a
means with some sort of primordial soup. No way. That is a major
leap of faith. Something else to consider. We can look at objects people have
made and as we zoom in to the scanning microscopic realm we find the
structure has flaws that were not visible. As examples, the Titanic
sunk largely due to sulfur impurities in the steel, making the structure more
brittle in the icy water. Airplanes have crashed with similar imperfections
in the jet fan blades and other minute problems. As one looks at life,
organisms maintain incredible organization, as organized in the
submicroscopic realm as in all other levels of observation. (It wasn’t an
accident that "organisms" and "organization" are similar words.) Both views of creation (young and old earth theories) have some
merit. Some believe the Genesis account with a literal 6-day time
frame, as we know it. Others believe God could have taken 6 figurative
years (millions?) to form the creation. The bottom line is, God did it. So……. Evolution occurs by chance or chaos? We could spend hours
discussing the leap of faith and obvious fallacy demanded by such thought, as
it is much harder to believe than to credit the obvious works of a
creator. This has been wonderfully discussed by Professor Philip
Johnson, an incredibly intelligent Christian from the Law School at Berkeley
California who wrote Darwin on Trial. As advanced as our thinking is,
if there was a Big Bang (a theory that strongly supports creation), what
caused that to occur and why did we come about? There are many more
questions than answers for those who choose to believe strictly in
chance. When we decide to deal honestly with this issue, undoubtedly
the scripture is right. Almighty God deserves the credit, how ever He accomplished His works. As His Word
says, we have no excuse. Daniel 12: 44 But you, Daniel, close up and seal the words of the
scroll until the time of the end. Many will go here and there to increase
knowledge." We are in the end times. Christ said so and today we are 2000
years closer to the end. Yes, we have increased knowledge. The
verse also implies we would be spinning our wheels trying to elevate
ourselves. Does that verse seem to fit the world today? There is a God. Which god is the right
one or is there a right one? Why should we believe that the God of the Holy Bible is the GOD?
Why Christianity and not Judaism, Hindu, Buddhist, Heaven’s Gates and the
Halle-Bopp comet, etc? God reveals Himself to us today by the presence of the Holy Spirit and
His Word (The Bible). Only God can prophesy (predict) things with incredible
accuracy as He did. Take, for instance, Isaiah 53 (written over 600
years before Christ by the prophet Isaiah). This,
and many other scriptures specifically refer to Christ who came many years
later. Isaiah 53: 1 who has believed our message and to whom has the
arm of the LORD been revealed? 2 He grew up before him like a tender shoot
and like a root out of dry ground. He had no beauty or majesty to attract us
to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him. 3 He was
despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering.
Like one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him
not. 4 Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we
considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted. 5 But he was
pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the
punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are
healed. 6 We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his
own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all. 7 He was
oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; he was led like a
lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her sharers is silent, so he did
not open his mouth. 8 By oppression and judgment he was taken away. And who
can speak of his descendants? For he was cut off from the land of the living;
for the transgression of my people he was stricken. 9 He was assigned a grave
with the wicked, and with the rich in his death,
though he had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth. 10 Yet it
was the LORD's will to crush him and cause him to
suffer, and though the LORD makes his life a guilt offering, he will see his
offspring and prolong his days, and the will of the LORD will prosper in his
hand. 11 After the suffering of his soul, he will see the light [of life] and
be satisfied; by his knowledge my righteous servant will justify many, and he
will bear their iniquities. 12 Therefore I will give him a portion among the
great, and he will divide the spoils with the strong, because he poured out
his life unto death, and was numbered with the transgressors. For he bore the
sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors. I find this represents incredible evidence that the God of the Old
Testament, whom I worship, is the only true God. Only God knows the
future in such clarity, giving it to prophets as He saw fit. Isaiah was a
Jewish prophet that was telling of events to come. He wrote this
approximately 6-700 years before Christ’s birth. The verses above
described Christ in incredible detail. Many other verses in the Old Testament
portray Christ with clarity, giving more evidence each book was inspired by
such a God, not manufactured by men. He heals us by His wounds (Vs 5). When Jesus was led before His
accusers He kept His mouth shut with the exception of one short answer.
When criminals were crucified they invariably would go to a poor man’s
grave. Despite this, a wealthy man gave Christ his own tomb to be
buried. Many aspects of Christ are predicted in these verses from Isaiah.
Christ was despised and rejected by man (and still is), He suffered because
of His love for us, taking the punishment for our sin. This seems like a strange concept that God would punish Himself
(Christ-God the Son) for our sins. I have a friend who had a 10 yo. son. At that one time
he felt the need to spank his son for a serious wrong. He had an
interesting solution. He told his son that he had done wrong by not
properly training him, allowing for this error. The father asked his
son to spank him, his father. In response his son learned his lesson.
We should feel the same. Our father took the punishment for our
sins. As Christ said, we should therefore "go and sin no
more" or we continue to drive nails in Christ’s hands. Other prophesies are similar, scattered throughout the Old Testament
scriptures. Here is another example that, as an ordinary man, Christ
would have not have control over to causing the scripture to come true.
The custom for those crucified was to break the legs so the person hanging on
the cross couldn’t push up, speeding up the suffocation. Especially
when Christ was crucified, the Passover celebration was beginning (at the
exact which time the Jewish Priests sacrificed animals without blemish – a
prelude to Christ being the ultimate sacrifice). No one could be on the
cross during this holy holiday. Therefore, the Roman soldiers in charge
of the crucifixion went to each of the 3 being crucified and broke the legs
of the other 2. When they got to Christ, He had already died, but just
to make sure, they pierced Him with a sword in the side (as in verse 5
above). This too is predicted centuries before
in Psalms. Psalms 34:19 A righteous man may have many troubles, but the LORD
delivers him from them all; 20 he protects all his bones, not one of them
will be broken. Psalm 118: 22 The stone (Christ) the builders (Jewish nation)
rejected has become the capstone ; 23 the LORD has
done this, and it is marvelous in our eyes. This verse was verified in the New Testament with Christ: Acts 4: 11 He (Christ) is "`the stone you builders rejected,
which has become the capstone.' 12 Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved."
The prophet Daniel quite accurately told when Christ would be born and
sure enough, He was, hundreds of years later. (Daniel 9) There were other
traits of the Messiah (Savior) to fulfill the related prophecies. His ancestry was from the family of David (Jeremiah 23:5-6) The city of his birth was Bethlehem (Micah 5:1) The manner of his execution was crucifixion (Psalm 22:14-17) He rose from the dead (Psalm 16:10) The time of his coming was before the destruction of Herod’s Temple in
70 A.D. (Daniel 9:26) Many others (at least 48 specific prophecies) (Copyright 1995 AMF International) No other person fulfills the many necessary prophecies. Without
God’s inspiration man cannot predict with such accuracy. If the Bible
Code stuff happens to be true, that would be additional evidence why we
should worship God and no other religion. God Never Changes Numbers 23:19 God is not a man, that he should lie, nor a son of
man, that he should change his mind. Does he speak and then not act? Does he
promise and not fulfill? The inevitable conclusion is that only God can predict with such
accuracy and only Christ can fulfill this same scripture. If you are
skeptical, please prove me wrong. Look carefully at the
scriptures. I must warn you. God’s Word is powerful and there
have been many skeptics that have tried to prove the Bible wrong who changed their mind as the truth was revealed to them
through their study. You owe it to yourself to prove it wrong, if you
can. A harder concept to relay is the presence of the Holy Spirit. I
do not believe it is necessary to feel the presence of the Holy Spirit to be
convinced and to believe that the God of Israel is the one true God.
Given that, the presence of the Holy Spirit is an incredibly powerful sense
that confirms God’s power and honor. The Bible was written, without error, by God, directing men to put down
the information. The scripture is as perfect today as it was when it
was written. Today scripture has more complete meaning, as events in
history have increased it’s
understanding. When scripture does not seem correct to us, we must
realize our degree of understanding depends on: 1. Our limited knowledge of the past customs and events 2. Our limited understanding of Almighty God. 3. Our lack of faith in God. We can actually change the impact of each of the above. Prayer
and study are the key ingredients to a more complete understanding of
God. Faith comes as one studies the scriptures
and hears God’s Word. 2Peter 1: 20 Above all, you must understand that no prophecy of
Scripture came about by the prophet's own interpretation. 21 For prophecy never
had its origin in the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were
carried along by the Holy Spirit. 2:1 But there were also false prophets
among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you. They will
secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the sovereign Lord who
bought them--bringing swift destruction on themselves. 2 Many will follow
their shameful ways and will bring the way of truth into disrepute. 3 In
their greed these teachers will exploit you with stories they have made up.
Their condemnation has long been hanging over them, and their destruction has
not been sleeping. 4 For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but
sent them to hell , putting them into gloomy dungeons to be held for
judgment; 5 if he did not spare the ancient world when he brought the flood
on its ungodly people, but protected Noah, a preacher of righteousness, and
seven others; 6 if he condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah by burning
them to ashes, and made them an example of what is going to happen to the
ungodly; 7 and if he rescued Lot, a righteous man, who was distressed by the
filthy lives of lawless men 8 (for that righteous man, living among them day
after day, was tormented in his righteous soul by the lawless deeds he saw and
heard)-- 9 if this is so, then the Lord knows how to rescue godly men from
trials and to hold the unrighteous for the day of judgment, while continuing
their punishment. 10 This is especially true of those who follow the corrupt
desire of the sinful nature and despise authority. Bold and arrogant, these
men are not afraid to slander celestial beings; 11 yet even angels, although
they are stronger and more powerful, do not bring slanderous accusations
against such beings in the presence of the Lord. 12 But these men blaspheme
in matters they do not understand. They are like brute beasts, creatures of
instinct, born only to be caught and destroyed, and like beasts they too will
perish. 13 They will be paid back with harm for the harm they have done.
Their idea of pleasure is to carouse in broad daylight. They are blots and
blemishes, reveling in their pleasures while they feast with you. As you can see, this scripture is as alive today as when it was
written. All seemed fine in Sodom. Lot’s son-in-law laughed when he was
told the city would be destroyed. All was well,
the city was flourishing similar to our current stock market. Ezekial 16:53
"`However, I will restore the fortunes of Sodom and her daughters and of
Samaria and her daughters, and your fortunes along with them, Something else to consider. Why should God let you into heaven? Many more liberal thinkers have the notion that they deserve heaven
because they have concern for their fellow man and they get involved in
charity work and are doing things with good intentions. Many of us
believe we are kind, caring individuals and are not as bad as are some other
people. We can look at Mother Teresa and Princess Diana again. One gave
up all, the other was helicoptered in to make some
photo shoots, spread some money and soon left to go back to a life of
luxury. I am no better. We all want to do good as Diana did.
We don’t want to sleep next to the people who we are helping.
Christ did. He left unspeakable luxury to minister to us and to die by
our hands. Interestingly, the Jewish leaders thought
they were doing right.
Our works are as filthy rags. Unfortunately many will assume these works are better than those of
their neighbors and therefore how can a just God exclude them? The key
mistake is the idea that their efforts justify their salvation. What is
not as evident to liberal thinkers is that is exactly the problem with
legalism (which liberals generally abhor). Legalistic individuals also feel
they must do good works to justify their place in heaven. In
either case, therefore, their works are thought to justify them. What we need
to understand is that our good works are useful to show love for God but without
Christ it is hopeless and we continue to stand condemned before an
Almighty, Holy GOD who accepts only perfection. Isaiah 64: 6 All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags;
we all shrivel up like a leaf, and like the wind our sins sweep us away. As politically incorrect as it sounds, we have only one way to
heaven and a relationship with the real God. The incredible bottom line is – only the real
God could predict these things so accurately and without error as they
are. Christ is the only one who can fulfill the many prophetic
scriptures. The Bible verifies itself. If the Bible can show itself to
be a reliable predictor, we must believe the rest of the scripture in these
proven books or else suffer the consequences God outlined in these same
scriptures. Scripture is in complete disagreement with the current New Age
philosophy. Christ is - according to God’s word, the only way to
Heaven. Only way. No other. The Bible makes this perfectly
clear. As unfair as it seems to us, the Bible shows that believers
of other religions are lost. It may seem unfair from our biased
(self-centered) standpoint. It is clearly fair from God’s standpoint
(who is really fair and loving, and made the rules). We must trust Him
to be fair. I would rather trust my Creator to be fair than any person
I know. Suppose you were God and you saw that man couldn’t, no matter how hard
he tried, meet your expectations. Your response was to give man your
son as a sacrifice that would bridge the gap. Suppose man then rejected your
son and decided to do good works in place of accepting your perfect Son’s
sacrifice. Wouldn’t you reject such arrogance on the part of man,
thinking we could do better than His, Almighty
God’s, own Son!!? Consider this. A lot of people have died for lies. The Heaven’s Gates folks are good examples. Hamas Muslims believe
that if they take out some Israelis in a suicide bombing they will be
rewarded in Heaven. It isn’t too hard to be misled; believing a lie
that you think is true. What about Christianity? Is Christianity different? If we look at the disciples, nearly
all were tortured and killed for their faith. Were they deceived?
Who deceived them? No, they each saw Christ risen
from the dead and they personally knew it was real. Eleven men are not
tortured and do not die horrible deaths for what they know to be a lie, and
every one of them witnessed the resurrected Christ. They were not
deceived since they each verified the truth and there was no leader who
transferred his message to them. If it weren’t true, at least one would
have changed his story and denied Christ as God’s son under the pressure they
endured. If you remember Watergate at the end of Nixon’s Presidency, it
was not difficult to find an informer when the pressure was
applied. No other religion has such a reliable test. As witnesses to the miracles were the accusers as is clear in the
following scripture. Incredible as it may seem, the accusers were
verifying the fact of the healing of a crippled man well known by everyone
when they would have been first to deny it. Acts 4:7 They had Peter and John brought before them and began to
question them: "By what power or what name did you do this?" Notice the accusers of the disciples agreed the disciples actually did
work miracles. The Jewish leaders were at a loss. They too had unwittingly become very
credible witnesses to the name and power of Christ. Acts 4:8 Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them:
"Rulers and elders of the people! 9 If we are being called to account
today for an act of kindness shown to a cripple and are asked how he was
healed, 10 then know this, you and all the people of Israel: It is by the
name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified but whom God raised from
the dead, that this man stands before you healed. Acts 4: 16 "What are we going to do with these men?" they
asked. "Everybody living in Jerusalem knows they have done an
outstanding miracle, and we cannot deny it". The leaders could not deny the obvious. If they knew that the
disciples were lying, they would have exposed them and undoubtedly would have
had them (Peter and John) destroyed. They would have vehemently denied
their testimony. As ones trying to hurt the disciples, the leaders had
no reason to confirm their claim. This is powerful evidence for the
truth. So….. The Bible is the inerrant Word of God who revealed Himself
through it. The more one studies the scripture, the more He reveals of
Himself. We know that from the message, the Holy Spirit leading us, and
incredibly accurate prophecies. The God of the Old and New Testaments has proven He is the true
God. How does this relate to us now? We need to deal with eternity. God really is in charge.
There really is a Hell. We need to try to please Him if He really is in
charge and we want to love Him. By reading His Word we see what He
wants from us. The problem is simple. We really don’t want to
change for Him. We prefer to believe lies (such as if he is a good God
he won’t send me to Hell) since it fits what we want to believe. We,
however, cannot make the rules. God is sovereign,
He is more powerful than hurricanes. As Christians, if we really are
the bride of Christ, don’t we want to please Him, He who died on the cross
when He didn’t need to for us? Luke 18:10 "Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a
Pharisee and the other a tax collector. 11 The Pharisee stood up and prayed
about himself: `God, I thank you that I am not like other men--robbers,
evildoers, adulterers--or even like this tax collector. 12 I fast twice a
week and give a tenth of all I get.' 13 "But the tax collector stood at
a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and
said, `God, have mercy on me, a sinner.' 14 "I tell you that this man,
rather than the other, went home justified before God. For everyone who
exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles
himself will be exalted." How do we get to Heaven? Only through Christ’s blood, our faith in God’s grace and not by being
good (although He clearly wants us to work toward goodness). Repenting
(asking forgiveness for when we sin with a trend of obedience in our lives). Pretty simple, right? Nope. Tough. There is commitment.
He deserves and expects to be first in our lives. We are required to
put nothing ahead of God. Not your spouse, children, money, job, etc. |
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