“Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in
God; believe also in me. My
Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that
I am going there to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a
place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also
may be where I am. You know the way to the place where I am going… I am the way
and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If
you really know me, you will know my Father as well. From now on, you do know
him and have seen him.” – John 14:1-4,6-7 NIV
The world is full of suffering. Because of this, most of us come to Jesus and
pray for our suffering to go away. After our suffering is gone, some of us stay
of being connected to Jesus Christ because we feel that the Spirit of God is
powerfully working and moving within us (Romans 8:28). However, some of us deny that
Jesus Christ is our Lord and Saviour and return how they were living in—right
after suffering is gone. The truth is that we need to stay of being connected
to Jesus Christ until the end of the age, even though sufferings can still
happen. This is because He proclaims that He is the way, the truth and the life
(John 14:6). In addition to this, God wants
to make our worldly citizenship into the heavenly one but He cannot do this
unless we begin to accept and believe in Jesus Christ with all of our heart (Philippians 3:18-21). The main reason for
this is that we are not the children of God if we do not accept believe in Jesus
Christ as our Lord and Saviour (John 1:12-13), and all of us actually have
been sinning (Romans 5:12-14) by falling short of the
glory of God (Romans 3:23). “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in
Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 6:23) John 16:8-11 states that not believing in
Jesus Christ is indeed sin. If we do not believe in Him, then we basically deny
the fact that all of us have been created by God. This is because Jesus Christ is
the perfect image of God, and everything is created through Him and for Him. Jesus
Christ was crucified in the flesh, so that He has been the firstborn who was
raised from the dead, and therefore, He might gain supremacy (Colossians 1:15-18). “For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through
him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven,
by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.” (Colossians 1:19-20)
Who, being in very
nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own
advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a
servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he
humbled himself by becoming obedient to death—even death on a cross!
Therefore God
exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every
name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth
and under the earth, and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, to
the glory of God the Father. (Philippians 2:6-11)
In fact, when we enter the eternal kingdom
of heaven from the end of the age, God is going to wipe every tear from our
eyes, such as from our physical death, pain and mourning (Revelation 21:4). Therefore, since Jesus
Christ is a mediator between God and human (1 Timothy 2:5), we need to believe in Jesus
Christ until the end of the age, to enter the eternal kingdom of heaven (John 3:16-18).
If you declare
with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him
from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe
and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and
are saved. As Scripture says, “Anyone who believes in him will never be put to
shame.” For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile—the same Lord is
Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him, for, “Everyone who calls on
the name of the Lord will be saved.” (Romans 10:9-13)
So prepare your
minds for action and exercise self-control. Put all your hope in the gracious
salvation that will come to you when Jesus Christ is revealed to the world. So
you must live as God’s obedient children. Don’t slip back into your old ways of
living to satisfy your own desires. You didn’t know any better then. But now
you must be holy in everything you do, just as God who chose you is holy. For
the Scriptures say, “You must be holy because I am holy.”
And remember that
the heavenly Father to whom you pray has no favorites. He will judge or reward
you according to what you do. So you must live in reverent fear of him during
your time here as “temporary residents.” (1 Peter 1:13-17)
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