I decided to spend time on a blog in hopes to reach any of the masses that have been deceived by the false teachers, the agents of Satan, that have been working diligently throughout history.
Perhaps the most strikingly false and dangerous doctrine that has crept into contemporary Christianity is that God justifies the "good" Christian, the one that believes and is overall, "good".
(I'll pause here - this conversation can only include those whom trust Scripture as our source of truth.)
Why do people become Christians?
Why we need a Savior can seem simple to some, but gets complicated with time clocked on this earth. Minimally, we are by nature born into this world as children of wrath (Ephesians 2:3) with every ounce of our body and soul oozing with a proclivity towards evil, away from God. As life progresses, this gets complicated with consciousness of our deceitful heart (Genesis 6:5, Jeremiah 17:9) and all its inevitable desires, the general weariness of the life (and people) around us, and the general surrender to the horrendous lie that some of us are relatively good people, and, if we believe in hell and all those things, it is something for the Stalins and Madoffs, and, possibly even, the Vicks of the world.
The conversation of saving faith I think begins here, because true conversion I think begins here. "If we claim to be without sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth isn't in us" (1 John 1:8). Jesus came to save "sinners and not the righteous" (Mark 2:17). In fact, God's whole redemptive plan can be hung on Romans 5:8 and Romans 5:12: "But God demonstrates His own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us, " and "Therefore just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all men, because all sinned."
If we claim Christianity, if we claim Christ as our Lord and Savior, we need to understand, err, firmly believe, that through Adam we inherited a sinful nature, and our only chance is Jesus the Christ (John 14:6).
We maintain, that we are justified by the righteousness of God, as manifested by the faith of Jesus Christ. As Luther and some of the original reformers pointed out, Even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe: for there is no difference”, Romans 3:22, is central to understanding this. In other words, we are justified by the faith of Jesus Christ (Galatians 2:16), both through his perfect obediance, and his death and resurrection.
One of the most striking lines found in Scripture is "for everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved." (Romans 10:13b).
I am hopeful that this entire blog will begin, end, and hover over this Biblical Truth.
What does it mean to call on the name of Jesus to be saved?
Certainly, certainly, an awareness of a sinful condition must be present in order for anyone to be so desperate, so out of options, that they rely solely on mercy for their reconciliation to an invisible God.
The awareness of this condition was certainly present in Abraham, in Job, in David, in the sinner that beat his chest with is arms in agony of his self, and in the thief on the cross who saw his only hope at eye level.
Christianity, eternity, and this conversation, begins here, I believe.
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