Got Jesus?
Belief in Jesus Christ as your savior and developing a personal relationship with Him is the ONLY way to get into heaven. In John 14:6, Jesus states, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” God is “the Father” talked about in this passage. The Bible is clear that the only way to get into heaven is through an active belief in God’s son, Jesus Christ.
Every human being since Adam and Eve has been born with sin. We cannot get into heaven by our own merit. There is no amount of good deeds we can do in order to “buy” our way into heaven. The only person who can cleanse us of our sins before God’s sight is Jesus. In the Old Testament, the Hebrew people made animal sacrifices to cover over their sins and to appear temporarily clean before God. But the blood of an animal was only temporary. A perfect sacrifice was required to completely cleanse us of all our sin. This perfect sacrifice came from heaven in the person of Jesus. Jesus is God who came from heaven and was born as a human in order to share in our sufferings and to fully understand what we go through in our struggles. Jesus was fully God and fully human. Since He was fully God, He could not sin, but since He was fully man, He was also able to experience the temptation to sin. He knows and understands our struggles, but He was able to overcome them so that all humans who have ever lived and ever shall live can also be cleansed and overcome sin so we can enter into God’s presence unashamed. Hebrews 4:15-16 states, “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are? yet was without sin. Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.”
The first step in accepting Christ as Lord and Savior of your life is to realize that you are sinful and to acknowledge that as a sinful person you are going to hell (which is a place of eternal separation from the fellowship of God) if you do not repent of your sins. Unlike what the media portrays, hell is not a place of partying with Satan and his demons. The Bible clearly says hell is a place of “weeping and gnashing of teeth” which signifies utter anguish and despair, for all eternity. We as humans cannot be completely separated from our Creator and be well off. Neither can any of God’s creation. Since Satan is also God’s creation, and hell is a place of utter separation from God, Satan and all his demons will also be in complete torment for all eternity. In order to escape such a horrible existence, we must come before God in prayer and confess that we know we are sinful. Romans 3:23 states, “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,” and in Romans 6:23, “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” The death spoken of here is not a physical death, since all humans die a physical death, but it is a spiritual death in which we will be eternally separated from God. 1 John 1:9 says, “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.”
The second step in accepting Jesus into your heart is to acknowledge that Christ died on the cross for you and to make a commitment to follow Him for the rest of your life. Romans 10:9 states, “That if you confess with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” Also, Jesus says in John 12:26 “Whoever serves me must follow me; and where I am, my servant also will be. My Father will honor the one who serves me.” So you see, it is not just a recognition of what Christ did for us, it is also a commitment to follow Jesus Christ and His teachings through God’s Word, the Bible, for the rest of your life.
If you wish to make this commitment today, here’s a basic prayer you can pray. Feel free to say these words and just end with talking with God about anything you want to talk about. He loves us and wants to hear us talk to him. If you are angry, do not be afraid to tell that to God and tell Him why. He already knows our thoughts and our hearts, but wants us to communicate those thoughts in fellowship with Him. Please pray this prayer:
“Lord, I realize that I am a sinner and I always have been. I know that I will go to hell if I do not believe in you. I believe that you came to this earth, to die for me so that I may appear sinless before the Father and have eternal life. Please forgive me of my sins. I want to follow you and your commands for the rest of my life. Thank you for your sacrifice. Amen”
If you prayed this prayer sincerely in your heart, you are now a new creation and a brother or sister of Jesus Christ in God’s eyes.
2 Corinthians 5:17 ” Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!”
Hosea 1:10b “They will be called ‘sons of the living God.'”
Welcome to God’s family!