BECOMING A CHRISTIAN 3: SIN SEPARATES US FROM GOD
(Message by Tanny Keng)
1. Becoming a Christian
a) What steps are involved in becoming a Christian? Are there particular steps involved in being born again? What comes first and what follows? This question has come up more than you might think.
2. Sin Separates us from God
a) One of the things that is necessary is that we must see the exceedingly sinfulness of our sin. A person must come to realize that they are desperately wicked and at the present moment, before salvation, they are separated from God by their sins. God is so holy that He can not even look at sin. No one will enter the Kingdom of Heaven that is not made perfectly holy by the righteousness imputed toward them by Christ. There will be more on this later, but first, there must be an abasing of oneself, recognition that they are unholy and can not enter God’s presence and they are unfit for the Kingdom at this time.
b) Many people, before they come to saving faith, think that they are a pretty good person. Many feel that they should go to heaven because they do a lot of good things. That is not good enough and it is not how God sees mankind. How many apart from Jesus Christ are really good enough to go to heaven? “As it is written: “There is no one righteous, not even one” (Romans 3:10).
c) No people qualify for going to heaven apart from Jesus Christ’s saving them. Not even one human being who has ever lived is good enough to go to heaven without Jesus’ own righteousness. So we see that the sinner must realize that they are in need of a Savior before they can ever be saved. Nobody is saved by their good deeds, being a good person or by 100 million good works (Ephesians 2:9). “All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags” (Isaiah 64:6). Sadly, there will be a lot of “good people” who thought that they were a good person and that their good deeds were enough to go to heaven. Hell will be full of a lot of “nice people.”
The End ...
1. Becoming a Christiana) What steps are involved in becoming a Christian? Are there particular steps involved in being born again? What comes first and what follows? This question has come up more than you might think.
2. Sin Separates us from God
a) One of the things that is necessary is that we must see the exceedingly sinfulness of our sin. A person must come to realize that they are desperately wicked and at the present moment, before salvation, they are separated from God by their sins. God is so holy that He can not even look at sin. No one will enter the Kingdom of Heaven that is not made perfectly holy by the righteousness imputed toward them by Christ. There will be more on this later, but first, there must be an abasing of oneself, recognition that they are unholy and can not enter God’s presence and they are unfit for the Kingdom at this time.
b) Many people, before they come to saving faith, think that they are a pretty good person. Many feel that they should go to heaven because they do a lot of good things. That is not good enough and it is not how God sees mankind. How many apart from Jesus Christ are really good enough to go to heaven? “As it is written: “There is no one righteous, not even one” (Romans 3:10).
c) No people qualify for going to heaven apart from Jesus Christ’s saving them. Not even one human being who has ever lived is good enough to go to heaven without Jesus’ own righteousness. So we see that the sinner must realize that they are in need of a Savior before they can ever be saved. Nobody is saved by their good deeds, being a good person or by 100 million good works (Ephesians 2:9). “All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags” (Isaiah 64:6). Sadly, there will be a lot of “good people” who thought that they were a good person and that their good deeds were enough to go to heaven. Hell will be full of a lot of “nice people.”
Comments
Post a Comment