The Greatest Truth of the Gospel is this: You were born in sin, there dwelleth no good in you; stop trying to purge and cleanse your own heart; stop laboring to establish your own righteousness; stop resolving to quit this sin and that sin in order to obtain favor with God; stop trying self-healing, self-cleansing, and self-salvation, for that will only bring you to utter despair and eventual eternal damnation. The more you try to scrub and cleanse your own Soul, the filthier you will become. If you desire to be saved by your works, please remember just one sin will defile your righteousness, and one speck of your Self will spoil the Perfect Righteousness which God requires from you.
If you want to be saved your own works, you must be holier than the angels, you must be as Pure and Immaculate as JESUS Himself, for the LAW demands Absolute Perfection, and nothing short of Perfection. If you refuse Christ's Righteousness, then you must fulfill all the demands of Law flawlessly like Christ has already done, or you will be damned. The Holy LORD GOD ALMIGHTY with unflinching Vengeance will smite every Soul who cannot bring Him a Perfect obedience to His LAW.
The LORD looked down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there were any that did understand, and seek God. They were all gone aside, they were all together become filthy: there is none that doeth good, no, not one. God saw that mankind was lost in Sin, and then God took the sins of the whole world and laid them upon His only begotten Son, and made JESUS who knew no Sin to actually be Sin for us. As a result of this transference of Sin from the sinner to JESUS, now the sinner that believes in Christ Jesus is made Just and Righteous in God's sight. The sinner is made to be the Righteousness of God in Christ. Christ was made Sin, that sinners might be made Righteous. The cleansing of your sinful Soul can only come through Faith in the Precious Blood of Christ Jesus, JEHOVAH manifest in the flesh. You can search all through the Earth and Universe, and you shall never find another Detergent that shall take away the SIN stains from your filthy Soul, but the Atoning Blood of The SON OF GOD.
The one thing that is Needful is your individual trust in Christ Himself.
This is the Way to be Saved from the Wrath of God that will inevitably come upon your Sins:
(1) You must first assent/agree with the truth of the Gospel found in the Holy Scriptures; Simply take Christ at His word; Stop trusting to your own righteousness.
(2) Then accept/receive Gospel Truth for yourself; Believe on JESUS' name; Receive Him and His RIGHTEOUSNESS. Christ Jesus, who is the Water of Life, must be Received into yourself first.
(3) Then simply trust/commit your Soul wholly to Christ Himself; Trust HIM as your own Atonement-Savior-Substitute-Propitiation-Ransom-Refuge-Surety.
The essence of Faith is Trust, Reliance, Dependence, Leaning, Confidence in Christ. Fling away every other confidence, except Confidence in Jesus. Do not put an atom of confidence in anything you can do or be, but look alone to JESUS whom God has set forth to be the Propitiation for SIN. May the Spirit of God lead you to trust in Jesus.
Your Salvation lies completely outside of yourself. Your Salvation is only found in the Lord Jesus Christ, and not in what you have done, or what you will do, but ONLY in what Christ IS, and what Christ has done. If you try to add one stick or stone of your own (thought, work, feeling); by trusting in yourself at all, you spoil the Salvation of Christ for you. The Holy Spirit and the Law must first rout you of your own thoughts, feelings, and works. Salvation shall never be "Christ and You"; Salvation comes from Christ Alone. If JESUS is ever going to save your Soul, you let HIM do it All, and you must stand out of the way. The inner work of Salvation is all JESUS' doing, from beginning to end, first to last.
The LORD JEHOVAH deliberately laid the Sins of mankind upon His Dear Son. JESUS willingly bore the entire load of our sins as our Substitute/Surety. Jesus went to up Calvary's tree of doom and bore the Wrath and Punishment that was due for the entire weight of SIN, even the penalty of desertion, darkness, and actual death. By bearing our full punishment, JESUS put away Sin by burying it forever. Sin cannot be in two places at one time. If your sins are laid upon Christ, your sins are longer on your Soul. God cannot execute two death penalties for the same offense. If you forsake your righteousness, and receive Christ Jesus as your Atonement, then God cannot punish you. God's divine Justice cannot demand the penalty due to your sins twice.
Human nature refuses Christ's Free Salvation, and blindly heads off toward deadly way of trusting in its own doings and merits. Human nature looks anywhere it can to find some other ground of confidence; Human nature will trust in anything but Jesus Christ. Self-confidence and self righteousness must be killed. The Holy Spirit must turn your human goodness into bitterness, and your wisdom into foolishness. The Holy Spirit will bring to light the deep dark chambers of your heart and make manifest all your thoughts, imaginations, motives, intents, lustings, desires, anger, envy, pride, and rebellion. You must be fully weaned from your vain self-righteousness, and persuaded to be saved by free Grace in Christ.
Human nature doesn't like hear anything about JESUS CHRIST. The carnal mind will believe any philosophy except the true one. The carnal mind will study all wisdom except the Wisdom of God. He seeks high learning, but not the highest learning possible of Christ Himself. He loves everything except what God loves. He likes everything that man likes, but nothing that comes from God. He shuts his to Biblical truth, and avoids your company. He speaks well of all religions and says they are all good in their place, and all partly true. He says if a man is sincere in his religion, he will come out just fine in the end.
Every lost sinner is under the Curse of the broken Law. Cursed is everyone that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the Law to do them. No man or woman has ever continued in the perfect observance of the entire Law; therefore God's righteous Verdict towards every sinner is GUILTY. The commandments of the Law are perfect, holy, just and good. You have broken the Laws of God in spirit, heart, and act continually, and have provoked God's divine justice toward you. The wrath of God abides on the lost Soul. You are under sin and condemnation, and there is no hope for you by the works of the Law. The Gospel provides us a new and living way: Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ unto Eternal Life, and thou shalt be saved. To be Justified by Faith means to be made acceptable to God by Faith in Christ.
Blind eyes cannot see the resplendent beauties of Christ; Deaf ears cannot hear the wonders of the Gospel of the Grace of God. The Grace of God leads to you repose and recline upon Christ. Human nature wants to be propped up a tad by it own righteousness. Human nature cannot be persuaded to lie still and REST completely on the one True Foundation that has already been laid, which is JESUS CHRIST. Human nature desires to shore itself up with its own doings, and have a little dependence on itself, but that will never do. Be wise: REST on the Lord Jesus Christ at all times, in all respects, under all circumstances, for everything. Be very sure that you Rest your Soul wholly upon JESUS. Believe on JESUS for yourself. Somebody cannot see for you, or tell you what he sees, but you see JESUS for yourself. There can be no proxy between you and Christ.
After church going, attending the mass, a few extra prayers to Mary on Christmas day and on Good Friday, a little dose of sacraments, and you start to feel pretty good about yourself. But that putrid righteousness of yours, that you are so proud of must be thrown away/gotten rid of forever, for your Soul cannot be saved by the Righteousness of Christ while you put any trust in your own righteousness. Flush all the dung of your righteousness; pay attention now: you must part with your righteousness, or it will damn your Soul.
Many people today have a notion that Christ Jesus came into the world to save respectable people who do their very best, that attend worship services, take the sacraments, say their prayers, give to the poor, and try to pay their way. Human nature does all it can to get right, and stay right, and hopes that surely in the end it will be saved. Human nature's way of salvation is very mixed and is for good folks. This false gospel doesn't do away with JESUS completely, but it brings Him in partly. This damnable gospel is kind of a hodgepodge (jumbled-up confused mixture of deadly religion): where partly you save yourself, and partly Christ saves you, and the between the two, you wind up not saved at all. Their vain thought is that they can't do what they ought to do, but Jesus comes in to make up the difference, this is a very fatal mishmash religion. JESUS becomes an excellent make-weight that is added to their scale to make up the difference they couldn't seem to live up to, and JESUS comes in to tip the scale in their favor. BUT Christ came to save penniless sinners, not the righteous. This deadly gospel teaches that Christ comes to meet sinners half-way with their prayers, doings, and He saves them based on how much they have done. This false salvation is a deadly mixed bag made up of half of sinner and half of Christ. BUT Jesus came to save the sinner, and do all the work in you when you come to Him in your nakedness, filthiness, and spiritual death. JESUS must be get all the credit and glory for your Salvation, or you remain lost forever. Whosoever believeth in JESUS is not condemned, but has free eternal life.
We are guilty in ourselves, but we are counted as Just, because of what the Lord Jesus Christ has done for us. The Just shall Live by Faith. By the deeds of the Law there shall no flesh be justified. Being justified Freely by God's Grace through the Redemption that is in Christ Jesus. The only way of escape from the Curse is through the BLOOD of God shed by Jesus Christ. Jesus was made a Curse for us. JESUS stood in our place, and bore the full punishment due to our guilt, and He became a Curse on our behalf. JESUS lived a life of sinless Perfection, and then He offered up Himself (His body, soul and spirit) on the Cross and became the One all-sufficient Real Sacrifice for human sins made unto the Most High God.
God sent JESUS down to a manger in the form of a Jewish infant. He slept where the oxen and sheep fed. As a young man, He toiled in his step-father's carpenter shop, driving nails and sawing wood. JESUS preached and taught among the scribes and Pharisees and their cunning eyes watched Him, and their vicious tongues scourged Him with vile slanders. God sent JESUS to hunger, thirst, and live in poverty, for He had no where to lay His head. God sent JESUS to face scourging and crowning with thorns, giving His back to the smiters, and His cheeks to them that plucked off the hair. Behold the Lamb of God dying on the Cross in anguish: God laid our sins on JESUS, and JESUS becomes SIN, and God the Father hides His face from JESUS. JESUS cries out, "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me!" God the Father delivered up His Son for us all; God gave His Dear Son to Ransom the souls of the sinful. The Father gave JESUS to be made a CURSE for us. JESUS died the JUST for the unjust to bring us to God. The divine JUSTICE of God is vindicated by JESUS' sinless Blood ATONEMENT, and God's Mercy is now available to all sinners. Human sin was laid on JESUS and punished fully in the Person of Christ Jesus, yet Mercy is extended to the guilty Soul. Full Atonement has been made, and the utmost Ransom has been paid in full. There is nothing for you to pay or earn. The innocent Lamb of God bore the crimes of the guilty, that they might be freely forgiven and made accepted in the beloved.
