Millisecond

It can happen in a millisecond.

God can forgive you of all of your sins, past, present and future. No matter how many times you have broken God’s Law, the Ten Commandments, your case can be legally closed and you can be declared innocent.

Your life, same as mine, has been full of lying and stealing (broken the 9th and 8th commandments), of lust (7th commandment), of using God’s name without respect (3rd commandment), of desiring our neighbor’s car (10th commandment) and of hatred towards other people (6th commandment). Since the beginning until now, our heart has rebelled against God and we have totally transgressed his moral Law.

If you have lied or lusted only once a week and you are 30 years old, that means that you have broken God’s Law (sinned) 1’560 times!! Do you know someone that has broken your city’s law more than 1’500 times? Well YOU have violated God’s Law much more than that, do the math per week or per day or per hour… how many times do you lie and lust? Now add the stealing, blaspheming, coveting, hating, etc.

With all that against you and me, in a millisecond God, who is rich in mercy, can declare us innocent by crediting to our account Christ’s righteousness and perfection. Our sins (law-breaking) can be erased and never again remembered.

How come?

What happened on that cross was that Jesus sacrificed himself to pay the fine for the Law that you and I broke. He suffered and died to satisfy God’s justice but he also lived a perfect and sinless life so it can be counted as ours. Jesus rose from the death and demonstrated that his sacrifice was accepted by God.

Even if the crucifixion happened over 2000 years ago, in just a millisecond, God is willing to apply that sacrifice to you, so that your crimes (law-breaking) are paid for. God did it all, He provided the perfect sacrifice and nothing can be added from our side.

However, we need to REPENT that means to turn from sin and towards God. We know every time that we sin because we have a conscience that helps us and warns us. Gotta stop those lies, those illegal downloads (stealing), looking at porn and lusting after people (adultery) and turn to God. We also need to TRUST in Jesus since his sacrifice is the only means by which our fine can be paid and therefore our case closed. We cannot leave the courtroom without receiving our deserved punishment (eternity in Hell) or to accept that someone else (Jesus) can pay our fine.

The moment you do that, in a millisecond, your name will be written in the Book of Life. When you die and face the Judge of the universe, you will be innocent and free; you will be justified. You will have eternal life in Heaven!

Please sincerely REPENT and put all your TRUST in Jesus today and in just a millisecond, your eternal destination will be established.

The Great X-change

The Law of God (10 Commandments) leave us helpless before a holy God that demands perfection in thought, word and deed.

We cannot help ourselves. Our good works don’t impress God and cannot pay for the ‘crimes’ we have comitted against His holy Law.

But God is rich in mercy and sent Jesus to fulfill the Law. He lived a perfect life in thought, word and deed. Jesus then went to the cross to suffer and die for the sins of the world.

This is the Great Exchange: Jesus took your sins and offers His righteousness. He lived the perfect life we were supposed to live and died the death we were supposed to die. Jesus took the punishment for our sins and gives us the reward for His perfection.

“God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God”. (2 Cor 5:21)

God looks at the cross and sees You, then looks at you and sees Jesus.

This… is the Great Exchange.

Repentance

Let every man understand that he will never have remission of sin while he is in love with sin, and that if he abides in sin, he cannot obtain the pardon of sin. There must be a hatred of sin, a loathing of it, a turning from it, or it is not blotted out.

We are to preach repentance as a duty. “The times if this ignorance God winked at, but now commands all men everywhere to repent.” “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ or the remission of sins.” He that has sinned is bound to repent of having sinned. It is the least that he can do. How can any man ask God for mercy while abides in his sin?

 
We are to preach the acceptableness of repentance. In itself considered, there is nothing in repentance deserving of the favor of God, but the Lord Jesus Christ having come, we read, “He that confesseth and foresaketh his sin shall find mercy.” God accepts repentance for the sake of His dear Son. He smiles upon the penitent sinner, and puts away his iniquities. This we are to make known on all sides.

 
We are also to preach the motives of repentance- that men may not repent from mere fear of Hell, but they must repent of sin itself. Every thief is sorry when he has to go to prison; every murderer is sorry when the noose is about his neck. The sinner must repent, not because of the punishment of sin, but because his sin is sin against a pardoning God, sin against a bleeding Savior, sin against a holy Law, sin against a tender gospel. The true penitent repents of sin against God, and he would do so even if there were no punishment. When he is forgiven, he repents of sin more than ever, for he sees more clearly than ever the wickedness of offending so gracious a God.

 
We are to preach repentance in its perpetuity. Repentance is not a grace, which is only to be exercised by us for a week or so at the beginning of our Christian career. IT is to attend us all the way to Heaven. Faith and repentance are to be inseparable companions throughout our pilgrimage to glory. Repenting of our sin and trusting in the great Sinbearer- this is to be the tenor of our lives; and we are to preach men that it must be so.

 

We are to tell them of the source of repentance, namely, that the Lord Jesus Christ is exalted on high to give repentance and remission of sins. Repentance is a plant that never grows on nature’s dunghill. The nature must be changed, and repentance must be implanted by the Holy Spirit, or it will never flourish in our hearts. We preach repentance as a fruit of the Spirit, or else we greatly err.

 

– Charles Spurgeon