Friday, October 28, 2005
Unconditional Love
For there is one God and one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus.
—1 Timothy 2:5
Many people have gone to church their entire lives and may think of themselves as Christians, but their concept of God is that of One who needs to be appeased. They believe the more good works they do, the more they will appease God. They are not able to say with complete confidence, “I know that if I were to die today, I would go to heaven.” They want to go there. They think there is a very good chance they will go there. But they are not certain.
God wants us to have assurance of our salvation. But here is what it comes down to: No matter how good of a life we live, no matter how many laws we keep and rituals we observe, we are never going to satisfy the requirements of God on our own.
But if we realize that Jesus Christ died on that cross in our place, that He and He alone satisfied the righteous demands of God, and if we put your faith in Him, then we will be just fine. The way I am going to get into heaven on that final day is not because I am a pastor. I am going to get into heaven because of the shed blood of Christ, because I admitted I was a sinner, and because I repented of my sin and put my faith in Him.
That’s the same way we all get in. Everyone comes in through the shed blood of Christ. Maybe you have been trying to please God all these years and have never known that He loves you. You don’t have to earn His love. You have it. It’s there. Unconditionally.
Copyright © 2005 by Harvest Ministries. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New King James Version, copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Bible text from the New King James Version is not to be reproduced in copies or otherwise by any means except as permitted in writing by Thomas Nelson, Inc., Attn: Bible Rights and Permissions, P.O. Box 141000, Nashville, TN 37214-1000.