The Reality of Sin and the Glorious Gospel of Christ
The Bottom-Line Up Front (BLUF)
Sins are eternally serious and damning, and Hell is a real place where sinners burn because they died in their sins. The root problem of the natural man is his sinful propensities, but the glorious remedy is found entirely in the finished work of Jesus Christ. JESUS' sinless life, bloody violent death, and miraculous Resurrection from the dead is the only way to escape the Judgment of God and wrath of hell. Today and now—not tomorrow—sin must be dealt with immediately, decisively, radically, and thoroughly through faith in GOD'S BLOOD. Yield to the Holy Spirit, turn from sin, and trust in Christ's finished atonement so your sins can be completely expunged before God forever.
The Danger: Sin, Judgment, and the Fallacy of Formalism
There will be a Judgment in the world to come; a day when God will execute His holy Justice upon the sinful rebellion of men and women. Man toys with his sins and trivializes hell. Until you are born again, you are enslaved and condemned by your sins. Every sin you commit is an inside job; every sin begins in your thoughts and desires. If you fly with the crows, you're going to get shot. Sin eats away at your soul like a deadly cancer.
Human nature is infatuated with external formalism, not internal faith. The Sins you have committed in the sight of God every day of your have blinded your soul and hardened your heart, and robbed you of all spiritual vision and feeling. Strict religious orthodoxy is only skin deep; God looks on your heart. Self-righteous human nature has a fixation with do's and don'ts, that is, vain religion, moralism, externalism, and formalism. The natural man hides behind his intellectualism and religious activity, using his ability to maintain all external rites, rules, and regulations as a smokescreen. You fail to keep the Law of God every day, so you create a convenient smokescreen by adding your own little human checklist of religious duties, thinking it can make you acceptable in God's holy sight.
As long as you think you keep your list of what is acceptable to you, the fact that you are still challenged by God's Law doesn't concern or worry you any longer. This is human nature's deceitful way of deadening and searing the conscience. Religious formalism cannot cope with regeneration and face the facts of the new birth from the Spirit of God alone; it discredits the atonement of JESUS and denies the miracle of regeneration from the Holy Ghost. Self-righteous religionists are filled with spiritual arrogance and seek to gain control, intimidate, and create fear. Clarity and simplicity frighten the religionist, for he focuses on temporal externals without any regard to the eternal inner working of the Holy Ghost. They pay lip service and eyeservice as menpleasers to religious things, not the things which are JESUS CHRIST'S. But you must have peace with God through Christ's divine blood.
The Divine Solution: The Substitutionary Atonement and Expungement of Sin
The Lord Jesus Christ is God manifest in the flesh, and He out of nothing and by His power alone created the worlds and the ends of the earth and all that therein is, and this same Man bled and died upon THE CROSS to rescue sinners from the wrath to come. God's holy nature, man's sinful state, Christ's Blood Atonement, God's free Gift of Salvation, and man's necessary response to this divine gift form the core of the Gospel. God laid down His life in the person of Jesus Christ for every sinner.
It pleased God the Father out of infinite mercy to lay your sins upon His Son, the Substitute and sinless Sacrifice for human sin. Jesus Christ took the full load of your sins up to the Cross, and then suffered for them, and carried them away forever. God vented all His wrath against sin when He laid our iniquities upon JESUS. God loved your soul by delivering up His sinless Son in your place, so you would not be punished by God forever. The saving, finished work of THE CROSS is the only way to Heaven.
Consider now the spirituality and broadness of the Law, the perfection the Law requires of you, and the Law's unflinching severity. God's Justice is stern and unflinching, and you must find a sinless Substitute for yourself that God will accept in your place, for God must exact every jot and tittle of the Law that you have broken at your Substitute's hand. Holy Justice demands sinless BLOOD, paying the price for your Sin to its utmost. But know this: JESUS has suffered the punishment in your stead, and God would be unjust if He were to punish you again, for Christ suffered once, and satisfied divine justice forevermore. You stand in Christ's safe place, and JESUS stands in your condemned place. You are a sinner, but Christ died for sinners; you deserve eternal punishment, but JESUS died as your ransom, and now God cannot ask for your sin debt to be paid twice.
That is impossible, for God has cancelled all your sins through Christ's Blood Atonement. The Savior's sinless obedience and innocent most Precious Blood hide all your transgressions from God's eternal view. There is not a sin against you in God's record books; they have all been expunged by the Blood of Christ and cancelled forever—this is called the Remission of Sins.
Only JESUS can expunge human sins—crimes against God's divine Law and Justice—so that at the Judgment you can answer No to the question "Have you ever committed a crime against God your Maker?" without fear. Expunge is to cancel out and destroy completely the court records of an acquitted defendant, to erase or strike out a crime, and to eliminate and blot out an offense. When an expungement is granted, the person may for most purposes treat the event as if it never occurred. JESUS is the Great Sin Expunger. Though your sins be as many as the stars, the grains of sand on the sea, or the drops of dew in number, yet one act of Christ's remission can cancel all your sins in the twinkle of an eye. When JESUS cried out on THE CROSS as He gave up the ghost, "It is FINISHED!", your dreadful load of sin was gone forever, absorbed into Christ's precious blood and taken away.
The Necessary Response: Repentance, Faith, and Heart Transformation
Salvation is not a reward for the religious; salvation is a free gift for the guilty rebel. Salvation is not a goal to be achieved or attained by human merit; eternal salvation is a divine gift to be received from the hand of Jesus Christ. God's holiness demands absolute sinless perfection, and you can never supply that due to your sins; the best that you can do will never be enough. Your soul needs no other garment of protection than Christ's imputed righteousness.
You are completely wrong deep inside, and you know you are when you get by yourself; you are lost and heading in the wrong direction into the dark abyss of sin. You must turn around/repent and ask JESUS to be the Good Shepherd of your soul. Your spirit must be broken by the Law, and healed by THE CROSS.
JESUS must recreate within you what your sins have destroyed and taken away. You cannot change your inward sinful nature, but there is a Person who can. Let JESUS take away your sins, or your sins will surely damn you. Your filthy mind, impure desires, and vile corruptions of your soul called iniquities must have the pure Blood of the Lamb of God sprinkled on them. Let the light of the glorious gospel of Christ shine into your heart today.
A Sinner's Cry and Prayer for Mercy
God, be merciful to me a sinner. Lord Jesus, please give me a true interest and sincere belief in You. Help Thou me, for I am in sin trouble, hear my prayer, change my heart, turn me to You, and I shall be turned. Have mercy upon my sinful soul, take away all my iniquities. Holy Ghost, please lead me to Calvary, have mercy upon me, grant me JESUS' salvation freely. JESUS, Please save me now from the wrath to come, create in me a clean heart through Your atoning blood, receive me graciously through Your atonement, give me Your grace. I need real Faith in You; give me Faith in Your Precious Blood.
The glorious gospel declares that because sin has condemned you to a real and eternal Hell under the unflinching justice of a holy God, your only hope of rescue is the finished substitutionary sacrifice of Jesus Christ, who shed His precious blood and died on the cross to completely expunge your sin debt. You must abandon all trust in your own self-righteousness, external religious formalism, and human merit, recognizing that you are utterly helpless and lost within yourself. By turning from your sin in genuine repentance and placing your whole trust in the finished work and blood atonement of Jesus Christ, your sins are permanently forgiven, washed away, and cancelled forever before you enter eternity.
