What is our faith? Whom do you trust, God or man? What defines you as a believer(saint), what a man says your are or what God says you are? Do you let a man determine whether or not you are saved or do you believe the Word of God and let Jesus settle that in your heart, by the Truth He has given us in His Word. My desire is that you get free, be free and stay free.
Religion has a way of getting believers to wonder whether or not they are really saved or not. It also sometimes attempts to get people to abide by man made doctrines whose only result is to put believers in a type of bondage or even doubting what their faith. Anything that attempts to put a believer back into bondage or doubt their faith is a doctrine of demons. Jesus wants you to be free and know that He is your Savior. Not free to sin, but free from untruths that would put you back into the bondage He set you free from.
Jesus said this in the Gospel of John, Chapter 8, verses 31 and 32:
"If you abide in My Word, then you are truly disciples of mine;
and your shall know the Truth and the Truth shall SET YOU FREE"
So what is the Truth that sets you free? The Gospel is the Truth. Well what is the Gospel?
The Apostle Paul wrote this in his epistle to the Romans, Chapter 1, verses 16-17:
"For I am not ashamed of the Gospel, for it is the power of God
for salvation to EVERYONE who believes, to the Jew first and also
to the Greek(meaning non-Jew), For in it the righteousness of God
is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, 'But the righteous
shall live by faith'."
Note the EVERYONE in that passage. I will be talking about that in detail throughout this blog and maybe into the next. EVERYONE is one of the things that will allow people to get saved and know they are saved when they believe the Gospel.
The Gospel is the Power of God for Salvation. So what is the Gospel (Truth That Sets Us Free)?
The Gospel leads to Salvation. The Gospel sets us free. So Salvation is freedom. So what is the Gospel? So to believe the Gospel, it only makes sense that we know what the Gospel is, in which we need to believe.
The Gospel (Truth)
1. A virgin, named Mary, conceived a Son by the Holy Spirit Himself. Matthew 1:18-21
"Now the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows. When his Mother Mary
was betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found with
child by the HOLY SPIRIT. And Joseph her husband, being a righteous
man, and not wanting to disgrace her, desired to put her away secretly.
but when he had considered this, behold an angel of the Lord appeared
to him in a dream, saying, 'Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take
Mary as your wife; for that which has been conceived in her is of the
HOLY SPIRIT. And she will bear a Son; and you shall call His name
JESUS (YESHUA:THE LORD OUR SALVATION), for it is He who
will save His people from their sins'."
You can also read in Luke 1:26-38. If you don't have a Bible you can go to my 4 part blogs on the Christmas story. It will be in part 2.
2. This child, Jesus, will grow up and be the sacrificial Lamb of God who would take away the sin of the world. The Gospel of John, Chapter 1, verse 29:
"The next day he (John the Baptist) saw Jesus coming to him and said,
'Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the SIN of the world'."
3. The Lamb of God will be crucified on the cross to bare our sin. Jesus actually became sin so that sin could be put to death and He then buried sin when Jesus, being sin, was buried. Paul wrote in 2nd Corinthians, Chapter 6, verse 21;
"He (God) made Him (Jesus) who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf,
that we might become the righteousness of God in Jesus."
If you believe this Gospel, this is how you are born of above and born again of the Spirit of God that Jesus said was the requirement to be able to enter the kingdom of God. John's Gospel 3:3-8:
"Jesus answered and said to him, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one
is born again, he cannot see the Kingdom of God." Nicodemus said to
Jesus, ' How can a man be born when he is old? He cannot enter a
second time into his mothers womb and be born, can he?' Jesus answered,
"Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water (flesh) and the
Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of
flesh is flesh, and that which is born of spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that
I said to you, 'You must be born again.' The blows where it wishes and
you here the sound of it, but do not know where it comes from and where
it is going; so is everyone born of the Spirit."
So how are we born again? Since it is a requirement to be able to enter the kingdom of God, I am sure that you would agree that it is important to know how this happens. It happens through a baptism that only Jesus can give. Luke wrote this in his Gospel, Chapter 3, verse 3:16.
"John, the Baptist, answered and said to them all, "as for me, I baptize
you with water; but One is coming who is mightier than I, and I am not
fit to untie the thong of His sandal; He will baptize with the Holy Spirit
and fire."
Baptized with the Holy Spirit. Born again of the Spirit. You can see the correlation. So what do we do to be baptized by Jesus? Jesus chose you for Eternal Life when He gave up His own Life to be the Sacrificial Lamb that would become sin, bare your sin, and died on the cross for you, to free you from sin. The Apostle John wrote this in his gospel Chapter 3, verse16;
"For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that
WHOEVER believes in Him should not perish but have Eternal Life."
Notice WHOEVER, that means anyone and everyone who wants it. If you choose Jesus and what Jesus did for you on the cross, this is what will happen to you as written by the apostle Paul in his letter to the Romans in Chapter 6, verses 3-4;
"Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into
Christ Jesus been baptized into His death? Therefore we have been
buried with Him through baptism into death, in order that as Christ
was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father. so we too might
walk in newness of life.(Born Again)"
4. Jesus was buried and rose from the dead. When you choose Jesus and what He did for you on the cross, you actually put yourself on the cross with Him. You die with Jesus on the cross, you are buried with Him in the grave, you are raised with Him in the resurrection power of the Holy Spirit. You have now been baptized with the Holy Spirit. Do you see what has taken place? You, by being submerged into death and the grave, when you have been raised from the dead in Jesus, your soul is now filled with the Holy Spirit, and you have now been born again of the Spirit. Paul continued in Romans Chapter 6, verses 5-11;
"For if you have become united with him in the likeness of His death,
certainly you shall be like Him in the likeness of His resurrection,
knowing this that our old self crucified with Him, that our body of sin
might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin;
for he who has died is free from sin. Now if we have died with Christ,
we believe that we shall also live with Him, knowing that Christ,
having been raised from the dead, is never to die again; death is no longer
master over Him. For the death that He died, He died to sin, once and for
all; but the life that he lives, He lives to God. Even so consider yourself
to be dead to sin , but alive to God in Christ Jesus."
We have now become part of the body of Jesus. Since Jesus, who knew no sin, was the only person born on the earth that was guiltless according to the law, He is the only person qualified to enter the kingdom of God. With Jesus now becoming our righteousness, and with us being part of His body, He becomes our Arch that will allow us to be transferred from this physical realm into the Eternal Spiritual realm. " Unless you are born of the Spirit, you cannot enter the kingdom of God"
This is how it happens. This is the Truth that sets you free. This is what God's plan was. This is why He made the earth. To make an Eternal Spiritual body for Himself and make a New Eternal Creation, in His likeness, for WHOEVER would choose to believe the Gospel, the power of God unto salvation and Eternal Life.
This is what the early believers referred to as "The Way", because Jesus said, " I am the Way, the Truth and the Life."
Everything that is added to this, that a man requires for salvation, is just religion. Jesus set you free. Religion is what Satan has always used to keep people in bondage. Don't go back to Egypt. To many believers (Saints ) do not walk in the freedom and joy they were called to. They are held in bondage by the doctrines of demons. So consider this in Galatians 5:1
"It was for freedom that Christ set you free; therefore keep standing firm
and do not be subject again to the yoke of slavery."
In my upcoming blogs I am going to continue to help you grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus and help you to continue to walk in the freedom of our Lord.
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