With Easter having just passed, it’s important to understand the reason for celebrating the holiday. The death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ is a call to celebration for those who are believers. For those that have not accepted Christ as their Lord and Savior, the gospel is a call to true repentance.
My aim is to point more people to Christ, who is “the way, the truth, and the life’ (John 14:6). The only way to receive salvation is through the confession and repentance of your sins, a decision one must make in their heart.
It is an act of full surrender, turning from the ways of the world and choosing to follow Christ, not merely with words but with actions. Accepting the free gift of eternal life, which is available to everyone, determines where you will spend eternity.
The time that we spend on this Earth is a vapor according to James chapter 14; It is there and gone in just an instant. Once you step into eternity, your fate is sealed forever. If there is in fact life after death, then the way in which we live directly affects our eternity. Otherwise, it wouldn’t matter how evil we live, because we wouldn’t have to answer to anyone.
The Truth About Eternity
The culture has helped spread the lie that hell is a just place where people get to continue doing all of the unrighteous things they were doing on Earth. This could not be further from the truth. As it says in the book of Romans, “For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God.”
Hell, in simple terms, is the eternal separation from God, a place of indescribable torment and suffering, from which there is no relief. “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.'” (Mt 25:41).
This is the very destination that the Lord Jesus Christ died on the cross to save us from. He paid for our sins, a price that we could never repay, so that if we place our faith in him alone, he will forgive us and we will have eternal life in heaven.
Coming to the Faith
One obstacle that stands in the way of people choosing to accept and follow Christ (and believe what is in the Bible) is the notion that they need to have undeniable proof of his existence before placing their faith in Him. However, that would not be walking by faith.
The fact is, there is no way to fully comprehend the ways and reasoning of God. This is one of several reasons that we have the Bible so that we can learn from what he has revealed to us. It is also the reason that believers will spend eternity in heaven learning more and more about him.
When a student enrolls in a course that they need to graduate, they don’t typically say, “I need to have all of my questions answered before I can take this course.” Instead, they take the course so that they can learn what they need to learn. Students place trust in the degree program to equip them with the tools they need to navigate a specific career field.
The same up-front commitment is required for believing that the Son of God, Jesus Christ, died on the cross for the sins of the world and rose again three days later. He wants to have a personal relationship with each individual, and his invitation always stands. While receiving the gift of salvation is free, the gift does come at a cost; to forsake the ways of the world and follow him.
“Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God’s wrath remains on them” (John 3:36).
