The Gospel of Jesus Christ

What is salvation? This question is the most important to ask. Your eternal destiny is dependent upon learning the answer, then believing the answer. Thankfully you need not go any further. Salvation implies a need to be delivered, to be rescued; but, what do you need to be rescued from? You need to be rescued from God’s wrath and condemnation against your sin.

How are you, therefore, saved? Well, a Christian is called such because of Christ. This is the reason and purpose God sent His only begotten Son to come to earth; that is, to pay the debt and penalty of your sins. He paid the debt and penalty of your sins on the Cross, or as the Bible states it, “He was delivered for our offences”. However, if Christ stayed dead His salvation was too. Rather, He rose from the dead the third day for your justification; that is, for the forgiveness of your sins and the giving of His righteousness. Therefore, God sent Christ to die your eternal death, to pay your penalty. He rose again from the dead to give power to what He had done and to offer it to salvation from the debt and penalty of your sins. God’s provision of salvation is offered to you freely by His grace, by His great love toward you.

The Creator God is perfectly holy - you are not. This is manifest by the clear reality that you sin and you know you sin because of God’s law that you break. God is not only holy, but He is righteous, He is just. As any good judge and He is, The Judge: sin, crimes, evil, misconduct cannot go unpunished. In fact, just as the consequence of a lie is measured by whom it is against so is your sin measured by whom it is against; that is, the holy God. Wherefore, if you were to lie to a friend that is one thing, but if you are to lie on the stand to a judge, the consequences are greater and more severe.

Nevertheless, you need to receive the gift, and the only response that is compatible to God’s grace is faith. You cannot work for it; that is go to church, pay a tithe, give to charity, be water baptized, pray a prayer, or clean up your life for it. Faith is non-meritorious to its’ subject, but meritorious to its’ object. In other words, all the credit, merit, and glory goes to the object of one’s faith because faith is trusting in someone or something to do for you what you cannot do for yourself. When God sees your faith trusting Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection for the forgiveness of your sins His justice against you is satisfied and the forgiveness of sins is applied to you. Wherefore, the moment you trust Christ for the forgiveness of sins all your sins are forgiven: past, present, and future.

Therefore, the just penalty of your sin against the eternal, holy, righteous Judge is an eternal punishment. You must pay an eternal payment for your sin and this eternal payment is literally hell and the lake of fire. It is your sins and the debt and penalty of them that you need to be saved from.

This is salvation, this is how one becomes saved, this is what identifies one as a true Christian – first not what they do, but what they believe; that is, the shed blood (death) of Christ for the forgiveness of their sins that they may possess eternal life with Him in heaven instead of eternal condemnation and wrath in hell and the lake of fire apart from Him.  We hope and pray you trust Christ this very moment so that you know for sure if you were to die today that you would spend all eternity with God in the heavenly places.

If you have any questions we would love to be a help in pointing you to God's Word to answer them.