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If you are honestly trying to figure
out what Christianity is all about you may find some answers here.
I'll do my best to explain this in a way that makes sense. God
promises to reveal His true nature to anyone who honestly seeks Him and is not
afraid to honestly ask God tough questions. God promises this: |
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You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.
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- A Christian believes in God
who revealed himself in the Holy Bible. God is like
"instant community" because He is composed of three beings
in one: God the Father, God the Son
(Jesus Christ) and God the Holy Spirit (the
part of God that lives within you once you ask Jesus Christ to
change your life and forgive your sin). The 3 of them work
together for your salvation from sin.
In the Old Testament in Deuteronomy 6:4 it is written:
Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the
LORD is one. There is one God. The
Hebrew word "Elohiym" translated into English as "our
God" is a plural word. In Genesis 1:26 it is
written: Then God said, "Let
us make man in our
image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and
the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over
all the creatures that move along the ground."
In the New Testament in Matthew 28:19-20 Jesus says
this: Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the
Father and of the
Son and of the
Holy Spirit,
and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the
age.
God the Father describes Himself this way: "The
LORD, the LORD, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger,
abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands,
and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave
the guilty unpunished" Exodus
34:6-7
"guilty unpunished" means there are consequences to making
bad choices . . .
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- Almost everyone knows that we make
bad choices. A Christian knows these bad choices as "sin" and
that those bad choices keep us separated from God. We want to
do things our own way. We are self centered, independent from
God, each one seeking his and her own way, focused on getting all we
can for ourselves. What I call the "I, Me, My and
Mine" disease.
God explains it this way: People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God-- having a form of godliness but denying its power.
2 Timothy 3:2-5
Like Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, we want the things that God
says we cannot have. He says don't eat that apple; we want
that apple. So, instead of loving and praising and obeying the
God who created us, we try to keep Him at a distance. Because
of this sin, God has already passed judgment on all of us. We
are guilty as charged:
There is not a righteous man on earth who does what is right and never sins.
Ecclesiastes 7:20
The only thing awaiting each one of us is the court of God carrying
out the court's judgment. That's the bad news.
There is also some
Excellent
News!
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| Thank you to J.
I. Packer for the inspiration for this piece and his exhortation to tell
the complete Gospel (good news). Mr. Packer spoke at Amsterdam
2000 in the Netherlands on August 1, 2000 at the International
Evangelists Convention. |
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*All scripture is quoted
from the New International Version of the Holy Bible (NIV) |
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| Continue with
Excellent
News! |
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