Call-In Classic Christianity Radio – Bob George P678 (10-08-21)
The Problem of Man and the Solution In Christ Jesus
Many people said that they know someone who is going to heaven. When you ask him to explain, they say because he is a good person or nice or something like that. I used to hear people say that Catholics are Christian too. Now, I hear people say that Mormons are Christians too. Nowadays, you even have these inter-faith movements, a uniting of Muslims with Christianity, called Chrislam, as if they worship the same God. You are not a Christian, or a born again person, a child of God, by going to a certain denomination or even going through all the traditions of men established by that denomination (John 1:11-13).
John 1:11-13
11 He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. 12 Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God – 13 children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.
Whatever you believe concerning Jesus Christ must be in accordance with who Jesus is that we read about in the bible and what He alone accomplished for man by His death, burial and resurrection (1 Corinthians 15:1-4). He cannot just be a prophet or a good man, but God in the flesh (John 1:1-4,14), as both the prophets spoke of and the apostles testify and Jesus Himself identified Himself to be (John 8:24, John 8:58). The Jesus that you must believe in is someone who did not just merely open a door to heaven that then you must work hard to maintain through some traditions of men to make sure you have some hope of heaven. The Jesus of the bible died a death like ours, to take away the cause of death, which is sin, in order to give us life, not temporal life but eternal life, the very life of God in us. And when He died, He died to take away the sins of the entire world, back to Adam and forward to eternity. There is no longer any further sacrifice for sin for God the Father to say propitiation has taken place (1 John 2:2). That is, God the Father is completely satisfied with the blood of Jesus, of God Himself, as so precious that it can take away the sins of the entire world.
1 John 2:2 NASB
2 and He Himself is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.
The idea that you, me or anyone else are good people has nothing to do with salvation. We have a problem called spiritual death. Natural people can be nice people just like spiritual people can be miserable people. With a natural person without the Spirit, there are typical characteristics mentioned as to what a natural man does, as mentioned in 1 Corinthians 6:9-11. Does that mean those kinds of characteristics will always be seen in a natural man? No. Even Jesus said the Pharisees love their own (Luke 6:32, Matthew 5:20). So they can certainly be nice to their own children. And you can have those whose consciences have been highly trained to know what sin is and who have lived in a culture at one time, such as what the United States used to be, where homosexual behavior was considered great perversion even among the lost (Romans 2:12-16). So the homosexual lifestyle was not something flaunted in prior generations, and most people, even among the lost, would not even think of participating in such immoral behavior. Many a person will not even think of talking back to their teacher, for if they did, they would be sent to the principal’s office and receive a strong enough punishment to not even think about doing that again. But times have changed, and not for the better. See, the law is like a tutor to the lost, and keeps society in check outwardly, until such a time faith should be revealed (Galatians 3:24-25). But love is really the motivator for fulfilling the law (Romans 13:10). So, do you have the love of God in your heart? We love because He first loved us (1 John 4:19). So only the Spirit of God can change the internal issues of the heart (Matthew 15:18-19).
Galatians 3:22-24
22 But the Scripture has confined everyone under sin, so that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe.23 But before faith came, we were kept in custody under the Law, being confined for the faith that was destined to be revealed. 24 Therefore the Law has become our guardian to lead us to Christ, so that we may be justified by faith.
When a person acts contrary to who you are, then that makes you miserable. If you, as a college age girl, committed fornication, and became pregnant, there are certain natural consequences to that. One of that is the fear of being found out along with the temptation to add to what you already did, by committing murder, such as abortion. But God has so much greater plans for you than that. As a believer, there is no condemnation for you (Romans 8:1-2). God wants you to make right choices and walk in the new life He has given you. He even promises to cause all things to happen for the good, for those who love Him and are called according to His good purposes (Romans 8:28). That is not saying that what she did was good, and who has not done something wrong called sin, but God will use that which you did, that which was sin, and as you turn to trust Him, His grace increases all the more (Romans 5:20). That is the heart of God towards you. If you are in such a situation, listen as Bob George counsels a young lady who fell into this trap, and helps her walk out of that error and in accordance with truth.
You and I are not there to gauge how good and bad someone is, so as to determine whether God will accept them into His kingdom. For example, as you read Paul’s letter to the Corinthians, we see believers acting in a manner contrary to who they are, and Paul was sent to correct the situation by telling them the truth, pointing out their behavior, while exhorting them on the basis of who they are, a child of God, sanctified, or set apart from the thinking of the world. A thief is an identity of a lost person. That is what lost people naturally do and are prone to do. But you are a believer who has gotten caught up in believing a lie, and you are a child of God who sometimes lies and who needs your mind renewed as to who you are. As a child of God, it makes no sense to lie against your own body, your brother and sister in Christ.
3 John 3-4
3 For I was overjoyed when brothers came and testified to your truth, that is, how you are walking in truth. 4 I have no greater joy than this, to hear of my children walking in the truth
If God was in a situation of gauging how good or nice you had to be before you can get to heaven, what would He do? Think about trying to judge that. What if you were 49 and 9/10 percent good, and you just missed it? God said, “I am sorry. You are a 1/10 percent off.” How are you going to gauge that one? How bad would you have to be to miss eternal life? How good would you have to be before you earned eternal life? Nobody can answer those questions. God certainly is not going to. So He reduced all mankind to the fact that you are born into this world spiritually dead. That is a problem.
Romans 6:23
23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gracious gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Man had a problem and God knew what the problem was. We do not know what the problem is. We think we have a problem when we do not get to go to Disneyland. We have a problem called spiritual death, a separation from God. It happened when Adam sinned (Genesis 2:16-17, Genesis 3:11-17, Romans 5:12). The Spirit of God departed from him. Man was originally created and designed by God to have God the Spirit living in us. Now we must be born again. God in the man is indispensable to the humanity of the man just like electricity in a light bulb is indispensable to the function of the light bulb or gas in a car is indispensable to the function of a car. It is not complicated at all. We are made that way. It is the way those things are made. Natural man is down here today without the Spirit of God living in him, struggling trying to find the meaning and purpose to life (Genesis 5:3). There is no meaning and purpose to life apart from being indwelt by God Himself (Ecclesiastes 3:11). God created us for that purpose, to be indwelling in a man, whereby God in the man is indispensable to true humanity of the man. That is the problem. God saw that problem. We are too dumb to know what it is. He saw it.
1 John 5:12
12 The one who has the Son has the life; the one who does not have the Son of God does not have the life.
There was legal counsel in heaven saying we have got to find a way to correct this problem. What do we need? We need life. What kind of life do I want to give them? Eternal life (John 3:16). How can I give eternal life when the wages of sin is death (Romans 6:23). If I gave him eternal life and the wages of sin is death, the next time they sin they would die again. The only thing we can do to give eternal life is take away the cause of spiritual death, which is sin. In order to do that, Jesus, you are going down to this earth, and enter into the humanity of these people, with us, and you are going to walk on this earth in perfect love and thus fulfill the law that condemns all men to death (Romans 13:10, 1 John 4:8, 1 Corinthians 13:4-8). And then you are going to take that life of yours to the cross. You will suffer and you will die (Matthew 16:21). You will enter into their death with them but you are going to be raised from the dead so that life that raised you from the dead can raise them from the dead into eternal life (John 10:18, John 3:16). That is the plan of God. Mohammad cannot do that. Moses cannot do that. Pope cannot do that. People to people cannot do that. There is no one who can do that. That is a plan all of God and none of us. So he went to a cross.
2 Corinthians 5:21
21 He made Him who knew no sin to be sin in our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.
He died on a cross to take away the sins of the entire world from the eyes of God throughout eternity, back to Adam and forward to eternity, never to see them again.
Hebrews 9:28
28 so Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many; and he will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for him.
Why is he not coming back to bear sin? Because he has already done it. He did it once and He did it for all and He sat down at the right hand of God and said it is finished (John 19:30). It was all of Jesus and none of us. Raised from the dead so that life that raised him from the dead can raise you and me from the dead. That is what salvation is being freed from the law of sin and death by the law of life (Romans 8:1-2).
Colossians 2:13-14
13 When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, 14 having canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness, which stood against us and condemned us; he has taken it away, nailing it to the cross.
That was God’s plan. That is the only way we will ever be saved. It makes no difference if you are a good dead man or a bad dead man. The issue is not how good or bad you are. The issue is how dead you are. So come to Jesus for Life. And He shall give you His Eternal Life to live in you!
