By: Ragnar Blomfelt
Preface
”The Timeless Message of the Bible” is a little book written primarily for those who wish to gain a basic knowledge of the Bible and the Christian Faith.
The book focuses on the central message of the Bible and presents Classic Christian Beliefs.
The book emphasizes the New Testament message because it is the part of the Bible that deals with the central figure of Christianity – Jesus Christ.
The topics covered in ten short chapters are the most important in the Christian faith: Chapter 1: The Bible. Chapter 2: God. Chapter 3: God the Creator of all things. Chapter 4: Man – a Sinner. Chapter 5: Jesus Christ. Chapter 6: Peace with God. Chapter 7: Salvation and Faith. Chapter 8: Life with God. Chapter 9: Enemies and Friends of Faith. Chapter 10: The end of History and Thereafter.
CHAPTER 1
THE BIBLE
Of all the books in the world that have ever been printed, the Bible is the most widely read in the world.
The Bible is loved by millions of people. It is a book that is talked about and often quoted from. In many ways it is a literary masterpiece and it captivates people on all continents. To better understand the Bible, it is useful to know some background data. The Bible was written a very long time ago and over a very long period of time, roughly from 1400 BC to 90 AD.
The Bible is not one book, but consists of 66 different writings. The Old Testament contains 39 writings and the New Testament 27.
Many authors have contributed. Both known and unknown, from simple shepherds and fishermen to learned kings. When we read the Bible, we can also clearly see the special styles and characteristics of the various writings, depending on the time, the setting and the author. Those who know the two basic languages of the Bible – Hebrew and Greek – see this even more clearly.
lIn the pages of the Bible we encounter history, teaching, proverbs, parables, symbolism, apocalyptic, prayers, hymns and songs of praise. Both prose and poetry add variety to the reading.
In other words, we can look at the Bible as a mini-library with books by several authors and with varying contents. The Bible is like a beautiful and large bouquet of flowers with many colors, shapes and scents.
The Bible is unique and cannot be considered equal to other religious writings. Much of what the Bible conveys are messages that we cannot find a direct equivalent in any other literature. Despite the wealth of religious literature in the world, we would boldly say that it is only in the Bible that we find God’s message to the world.
Inspiration is a mystery
How exactly God gave the world the divinely inspired writings we have in the Bible, we do not know. In an unimaginable way, the writers were led by the Spirit of God so that they wrote what God wanted to convey. And this was probably not even the authors themselves often aware of.
We can say that the Bible is written by ordinary people and bears witness to their faith. But at the same time it is also divinely inspired. It is a great mystery. God used people like Moses, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Paul, Peter, John, all different personalities in the biblical world. And through them, God speaks to the world even today through all the messages they wrote down.
All Scripture is God-breathed
We believers accept what the Bible says about its own origin. And the Bible itself testifies that it is God who is the true source of Scripture. That is why we affirm its credibility and authority, and that is why we read the Bible knowing that it is something more than just the thoughts of men. We know that it is the word of God that it conveys.
This is how God instructed the apostles Paul and Peter to express themselves regarding the origin of the Bible:
All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for instruction, for conviction, for correction, and for training in righteousness. 2 Tim 3:16
Above all, you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture comes from one’s own interpretation. For no such prophecy was ever brought forth by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. 2 Pet 1:20-21
Therefore it is exciting to read God’s Word, for divine and eternal truths are revealed to us there. The curtain is drawn aside and we catch a glimpse of another world, a world where God reigns.
Jesus in the Scripture
Reading the Bible becomes even more interesting and exciting when we discover that it points to a particular person in different ways.
In the Old Testament we sometimes encounter events, persons, models and predictions that have in common that they point to Jesus Christ. He is ”hidden” a little everywhere in the Old Testament, as Jesus himself testified, see Luke 24:27.
And in the New Testament we see how the four Gospels; Matthew, Mark, Luke and John each complement each other and give their own picture of Jesus’ life and teachings.
In the Acts we can then read about how Jesus works and leads his church through the Spirit.
And in the last 22 letters of the Bible, we encounter the teachings of Jesus as transmitted by Paul and other apostles and disciples.
So Jesus Christ is the main character in both the Old and New Testaments. He is the heart of the Bible.
Jesus and the Scripture
When Jesus walked among men, he showed full confidence in the Holy Scriptures. We will look at three examples:
Jesus said when he was in discussion with some Jews: Scripture cannot be broken (John 10:35).
Jesus prayed for his disciples before his Father: Sanctify them by the truth; Your word is truth (John 17:17).
Speaking by the Holy Spirit, David himself declared. (Mark 12:36). Here Jesus is about to quote a scripture, but before that he wants to remind us that it was the Spirit who was the real author of this psalm of David.
Very often in his teaching, Jesus referred to the Old Testament, wanting to build up before the people everywhere a strong confidence in the Scriptures.
Jesus also promised that the Holy Spirit would come and guide his disciples into all truth, John 16:13-14. This meant that God’s message to the world would be supplemented by other sacred writings than those found in the Old Testament. And so it was. Holy Scriptures were created through some of Jesus’ apostles and their disciples. And these writings are collected today in what we call the New Testament.
After the last writing of the New Testament was recorded – probably the Book of Revelation sometime in the 90s AD – the world has no more sacred and divine writings to look forward to. It is the New Testament that is God’s last and final message to the world.
To properly understand the New Testament, knowledge from the Old Testament is essential. But it is the New Testament that is most necessary to know because it is there that we find God’s will and purpose for the world shining with the brightest light.
The Bible is the light on the path
The message of the Bible provides guidance and security. It can be expressed in such simple and beautiful poetry:
Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path. Ps 119:105.
For the author, it was God’s word that would guide his walk in the world. God’s word was the lantern on which he relied. He believed that Scripture provides guidance and light in a dark world.
And it is reassuring to know that in a world where lies are commonplace, there is still something that is absolute truth, something we can have full confidence in.
The fact that the Bible gives us the absolute truth does not mean that it is complete and exhaustive in everything. Far from it. But it does mean that the messages we read there are true and credible.
Everything that man needs to know in order to live a life that leads right is written in the Bible.
Left to himself, man wanders blindly in the darkness of ignorance. And out of a thousand throats comes a cacophony of guesses and theories about where we come from, why we live and where we are going. But only the Bible can give us a clear and adequate answer to these questions.
A necessary revelation
It is impossible for man with his own ability to try to understand who God is and what He wants, because the human mind and intellect have been damaged (as we shall see in Chapter 4).
That is why it was necessary for God to give us a very special revelation, a divine one, and not something that humans could think up. And that is why God gave us the scriptures that we have today in the Bible.
The Bible is first and foremost the book of the salvation that God has given to us humans. It reveals to us the God of love and holiness and wants to lead us to Him. The Bible therefore has a vital and urgent message that it wants to convey to every person in every age.
Jesus said: Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will never pass away. Matt 24:35.
CHAPTER 2
GOD
The Bible assumes that there is only one God. And that is the God described in the Bible and revealed to us by Jesus Christ.
All the millions of gods that people have worshipped in different ways and still worship today are considered false and empty. They are idols that corrupt people’s minds and lead them away from the one true God.
The attributes of God
God being God means that he has attributes that are unique to him. All that God Is, exists only in perfect form in God. We humans, for example, can show love and thus reflect a little of God, but God is perfect in love, he Is love.
We shall look here at the most important of God’s attributes. And at the same time we should be aware that in all that concerns God there are limits to how much we humans can understand. God’s essence is inaccessible to thought and reason. He is unfathomable. But overall, the Bible still gives us a lot for our understanding of God, such as the following:
* God is not created. He has no beginning and no end. He is from everlasting to everlasting.
* God is the only one who has the power and ability to do anything he wants. No one can stop him from doing what he has decided. God alone is sovereign, his will is always and everywhere done. We usually say that God is omnipotent.
* God is not limited to certain places. He is everywhere ever present, there is no place where God is not. He is as close to us humans as the air that surrounds us. God is spirit.
* Nothing is hidden from God. All that is perfect knowledge and wisdom is found in God. He knows all about everything and everyone. God is light.
* God is great and mighty. The seemingly infinite universe is created by him. God holds all creation in his hand and is in complete control of all events in history.
* It is impossible to understand all that God is doing in the world. His will and plan for all the peoples and countries of the earth are incomprehensible. But God never acts capriciously but always in accordance with his holy and good nature.
* God is God and not a man. Yet God is often described in the Bible in such a way that we humans can understand: He feels for a fallen world. He has compassion. He is gracious and merciful. He is great in gentleness and patience. He is love. His wrath is a reality. He is righteous and holy. And the special name He is often given in the Bible (OT) is Yahweh, which means something like ’He Who Is’.
* God will always be who he is. With him there is nothing that will ever change. He remains forever who he has always been.
This was something of the reality that is God. And we come to know and understand God even more by reading in the Bible how God deals in word and deed with persons, peoples and countries.
Jesus is a reflection of God
If we want to find out more concretely who and what God is, we should study the four Gospels of the New Testament. They make it clear that in all that Jesus did and said, God the Father was present and involved. Jesus came from the Father and revealed his Father to the world through his own life.
Jesus once said something that must have shocked those who heard him and still surprises many today:
Anyone who has seen Me has seen the Father … Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me. John 14:9, 11
The life and work of Jesus can therefore be likened to a clear mirror reflecting the true nature and character of God. That is why we can say: Look at Jesus and you see who God is!
The mystery of the Trinity
In the Bible we read about the Father, Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit. We are therefore going to get a taste of what is usually called the Trinity. Sooner or later, anyone who studies the Bible will want to understand more about it. But the intellect cannot grasp this vast and inaccessible reality.
Now, however, we can glimpse in the Bible certain outlines of what the Bible reveals about the relationship between the Father and the Son and the Spirit. Carefully and very simply, we could say this:
God is One. The Father and the Son and the Spirit are of the same divine and unique essence. They are not created but Are from everlasting to everlasting. The three live and work in a perfect unity and communion of love and holiness.
This communion does not exclude a kind of division of roles, in which the Father – to speak in human terms – is at the top, followed by the Son and then the Spirit. The Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son.
God cannot now be captured by human thought. Nor can He be grasped by any image or formula. Instead, it is a matter of humble realization that what we call the Trinity is largely incomprehensible to us little people. It is more a matter of faith – convincing and trusting faith – in what the Bible reveals.
CHAPTER 3
GOD THE CREATOR OF ALL THINGS
Man can fly to the moon and produce extremely advanced high technology. But all the scientists in the world combined would not be able to create even one small growing blade of grass. Only God can create the most important thing without which nothing in the natural world can function – life.
And the air we breathe, the water we drink, the bread we eat, our own bodies, the plants, the animals, the sun, the stars, yes, everything created and everything living is made by God.
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Gen 1:1.
So simply and majestically the Bible begins. That God Is, is assumed with great authority. And he is the author of everything, from the vast galaxies of the universe to the little ant in the stack. Everything was created in six ordinary days (Genesis 1) around 6000 years ago.
By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible. Hebr 11:3.
God sustains everything
God not only creates. He also sustains everything with vitality. We could not exist if God did not constantly give us life and spirit.
That God Is, that is the prerequisite for us to take our next breath. Even a person who angrily denies the existence of God has a heart that is totally dependent on God for its next beat. Every heartbeat sings and testifies to God’s grace. And the moment God withdraws his hand from someone or something, death and destruction are immediately there.
All living things are completely dependent on God’s active universal power, for as it is written: For in Him we live and move and have our being. Acts 17:28
It is God who guides the earth in its orbit. He is the one who gives us the seasons, who allows the sun to warm us, the rain to fall, the flowers to grow and the animals to find their food. The whole universe is under God’s complete control, second by second. Not a star is unnamed by God and not a sparrow falls to the ground without God’s knowledge and will, Ps 147:4, Matt 10:29.
But ask the animals, and they will instruct you; ask the birds of the air, and they will tell you. Or speak to the earth, and it will teach you; let the fish of the sea inform you. Which of all these does not know that the hand of the LORD has done this? The life of every living thing is in His hand, as well as the breath of all mankind. Job 12:7-10.
Sing to the LORD with thanksgiving; make music on the harp to our God, who covers the sky with clouds, who prepares rain for the earth, who makes grass to grow on the hills. He provides food for the animals, and for the young ravens when they call. Ps 147:7-9.
The Bible’s view of humanity
Contrary to evolutionism and Darwinism, the Bible conveys an incredibly bright, encouraging and positive worldview and view of humanity.
The Bible teaches that once, long ago, we were created human. And we have not changed. We are still human beings. No development in the evolutionary sense has ever taken place with us.
And at the beginning of creation, God was in communion with a perfect man whom he loved dearly. Man was then very good in God’s eyes.
The message of the Bible exalts man and gives him a unique position in relation to everything else created. Human beings have a completely different and higher value than plants and animals. This is true from conception, when man begins the journey of life. Of all the things God created on earth, it was only man with whom God had a special relationship. This is because Adam, the human being, was created in God’s image from the beginning, see Genesis 1:26-27. The highness and dignity of man can hardly be expressed in a more magnificent way than this. Man is the very crown of creation, the highest of all created things.
All this also means that there is a divine purpose behind human existence. Everything in life has a meaning and a purpose.
At the end of the sixth day, after God had made everything in heaven and on earth, the Bible says: And God looked upon all that He had made, and indeed, it was very good. Gen 1:31.
So when we look back in history at the morning of creation, we find out that the world was once in perfect harmony. There was no suffering, no pain and no death anywhere. There was a time of innocence, a time when everything in life was very good.
And even though something very destructive was about to happen (which we will read about in the next chapter), when we look out over God’s creation today, we can still be filled with awe at such a great and mighty God. For in the many faces of creation we can truly get a glimpse of God’s unimaginable power, wisdom and greatness.
(Two sites with teaching about creation based on the Bible: Creation Ministries International and Answers In Genesis.)
Worship the Creator!
God is the King of the world, Ps 47. He is the Creator who is able to do all things. He created out of nothing by his word. Therefore the call goes out to all peoples on earth:
Let all the earth fear the LORD; let all the people of the world revere Him. For He spoke, and it came to be; He commanded, and it stood firm. Ps 33:8-9.
You alone are the LORD. You created the heavens, the highest heavens with all their host, the earth and all that is on it, the seas and all that is in them. You give life to all things, and the host of heaven worships You. Neh 9:6.
The most natural and obvious thing, then, should be that man, the created, should always worship and praise his Creator, on whom he is wholly dependent for every second. But from the world comes mostly silence and confusion. We shall now read about the tragic reason for this.
CHAPTER 4
MAN – A SINNER
If God is almighty and good, why is there so much evil in the world? This is a common question when faith comes up. And it is only when we boldly take the Bible as our starting point that the darkness can begin to dissipate and question marks cleared up.
There are, of course, inexplicable and obscure riddles when it comes to evil. But the basic answer is already there when we study the first pages of the Bible that tell us about the beginning of history. After God created the first humans, the following happened:
And the LORD God commanded him, “You may eat freely from every tree of the garden, but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; for in the day that you eat of it, you will surely die.” Gen 2:16-17
The origin of sin
God created man free and independent, with the ability to think and make decisions. Now there was the ’tree of the knowledge of good and evil’ in the middle of the Garden of Eden. And there was only one thing Adam and Eve were not allowed to do – eat the fruit of this special tree. But they ate. They disobeyed and went against the will of the Creator.
That is how man became a sinner and was cut off from fellowship with his Creator. The sin consisted in breaking the commandment given to them in the perfect existence they lived in with their Creator. And Adam and Eve were driven out of the Garden of Eden by God.
According to Genesis chapter 3, it was the serpent who cunningly deceived Eve and drew her away from the word of God. Eve allowed herself to be captured by lust and ate. She then gave the fruit to Adam, who also ate.
It was the first time that the poison of unbelief entered man’s lives. It happened when they let their lives be ruled by the word of the serpent instead of the word of God. They were captured by the serpent that is the source of all evil and that always seeks to lead man away from God.
This rebellious evil power that now became part of man is always in opposition to God. In the New Testament, the ’serpent’ is often called the devil or Satan.
Through what we call the Fall, the whole creation became unbalanced. We see that very early in history, creation lost its sovereign status of being merely ’very good’. Something ”very evil” had now also swept into the world like a violent thunderstorm.
The very first pages of the Bible testify to the terrible spread of sin and evil on earth. Humanity eventually became so morally and spiritually depraved that God, in His wrath, sent the Flood over the whole earth.
Only Noah and his kin were shown mercy and were saved. And from Noah, new families grew and the earth was repopulated.
The fabric of history then takes on an increasingly clear pattern as God chooses a people for himself. It begins in embryo with Abraham and his family. After a number of centuries appears Moses, a man of God. He and the chosen people of God, now a few million in number, see God lead them out of Egypt through great miracles. After another few hundred years, we read about the great king and psalmist David and all his achievements and missteps. Centuries later, we read about all the prophets of God who appeared in the kingdom of Israel and Judah.
Through the history we get about Israel, it sometimes shines and we see God’s love and grace and a people living in faith. The message of hope shines through. But more often it is sin and unbelief, and above that the wrath of God that characterizes history, whether it is the chosen people of Israel or other peoples.
The consequences of sin
Some 500 years after the last prophet of the Old Covenant appeared, we meet the Apostle Paul who gives this dark diagnosis of the human race:
“There is no one righteous, not even one. There is no one who understands, no one who seeks God. All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one.” “Their throats are open graves; their tongues practice deceit.” “The venom of vipers is on their lips.” “Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness.” “Their feet are swift to shed blood; ruin and misery lie in their wake, and the way of peace they have not known.” “There is no fear of God before their eyes.” Rom 3:10-18.
The consequences of sin are incomprehensible in depth and scope. We will briefly look at what sin has done in human life through a few points:
* The entrance of sin into the world means that every man grows up poisoned by sin, and without the slightest interest in seeking the true God.
* Man’s mind has become darkened. His conception of God is perverted. He cannot understand God. For man, wisdom often becomes folly and folly often becomes wisdom. And what is love, truth, and justice to one may be cruelty, lies, and injustice to another. Confusion follows in the wake of sin.
* Man’s will has become perverted. He no longer wants what God wants, but only wants to follow his own selfish desires. Man wants to be his own master and god.
* Man’s feelings have been damaged. He may be unmoved by the enormous suffering of the world and at the same time be greatly upset by something insignificant that affects him. He is sometimes happy when he should be crying, and sad and bitter when he should be happy and grateful. He is often controlled by capricious irrational feelings. And sexuality and identity have become distorted and damaged in many.
* The strong power of sin makes man self-absorbed.
* As a result of sin, death has also entered the world. The forces of death are at work in man, and every passing second drives him nearer and nearer to the gate of death.
In general, people have difficulty with the concept of sin. They do not understand that they are sinners. And this inability to see and understand their sinfulness is also a work of sin.
The bitter reality is that a poisonous snake with fiery red eyes lurks in the breast of the human race. The human heart has become perverted in its attraction and desire for the impure and evil.
Our sinfulness can make any of us evolve into the cruelest monster. The dark forces of evil are within us, testifying to us daily that we are all children of Adam.
The Ten Commandments
The very existence of the Commandments indicates that something is wrong in the world. Of course, a perfectly good person who always wants to love God does not need commandments.
But now man has become so damaged, confused and blind that he needs divine guidance. It was through Moses that God gave the Ten Commandments. They were first given to Israel. But they are nevertheless meant to apply in all times and to all people. They can be seen as moral and ethical guidelines given by God for our good.
These are the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20), with a brief commentary on most of them:
I. You shall have no other gods before Me. You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in the heavens above, on the earth below, or in the waters beneath. You shall not bow down to them or worship them
There are many on earth who worship literal idols of stone, wood, metals and other things. But anything to which the heart attaches itself can become an idol. An idol becomes that which my inner self loves and finds security in, but which actually pulls me further and further away from the One and Living God. As soon as God gets away from my center, idols arise.
II. You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain, for the LORD will not leave anyone unpunished who takes His name in vain.
A person misuses God’s name who mocks or blasphemes God, and likewise he who uses God’s name disparagingly, thoughtlessly and without seriousness. Even he who use God’s name in oaths misuse God’s name. People who frivolously and often claim that God, Jesus, or the Spirit has spoken to them also violate this commandment.
III. Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy.
IV. Honor your father and mother.
This means obeying and showing respect to your parents, and in their old age taking good care of them in love and affection.
V. You shall not murder.
This is neither a prohibition of the death penalty, nor of the right of self-defense, nor of defensive war. It refers to illegal murder (cf. Ex 21:12-14). Anyone who murders a fellow human being, who is made in the image of God, deserves the severest punishment (see Gen 9:5-6). Jesus goes even further and says that even a person who hates his brother violates this commandment, Matt 5:21-22. The most blatant violation of this commandment is what is known as abortion, i.e. infanticide. It is institutionalized, gross and widespread, and thus constitutes a crime against humanity.
VI. You shall not commit adultery.
See Jesus’ explanation of this commandment in Mark 10:11-12, Matt 19:9. Jesus also says (as in Exodus 20:17) that anyone who has an impure sexual desire violates this commandment, Matt 5:27-28. Marriage between a man and a woman is a fundamental institution ordained by God from the beginning (Genesis 2:21-24) and must therefore not be violated.
VII. You shall not steal.
VIII. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
Not adhering to the truth in court, slandering and lying in everyday life, speaking disparagingly of one’s neighbor – all these violate this commandment.
IX. You shall not covet your neighbor’s house.
X. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife … or anything that belongs to your neighbor’s.
The last two commandments deepen and give weight to all the commandments. They are about desire and lust. It is not enough to refrain from stealing or committing adultery, God also forbids the hearts’s desire for it.
No one is capable of living by the letter or the spirit of the Commandments. It is true that a man can do much good to his fellow men and be justly appreciated for all the good he does. But before God, who sees what we do not see and knows what we do not know, almost everything we do is morally and spiritually polluted. Before each other we may measure up, but before God we all stand on the side of the lost.
Now, not many people today care about the Commandments or believe in divine laws. It is sin that makes us indifferent. And therefore man has also fallen light years from truth and purity. Man often enjoys what God abhors. Jesus said:
For what is prized among men is detestable before God. Luke 16:15.
The further away from God people wander, the more they will love what God hates and condemns.
Jesus is the knower of man
With Jesus, a new age was born. With him, much changed in the world. As for Jesus’ relation to the Commandments, we notice that he wanted to radically bring out the full clarity of the Commandments with their deep spiritual content. In doing so, he wanted us to understand that we are all weak human beings who cannot even come close to living as God wants.
Jesus knows man like no other. He knows the deepest layers of human nature. That’s why he can teach straightforwardly about where the root of evil lies and give clear messages about what is sin:
What comes out of a man, that is what defiles him. For from within the hearts of men come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, wickedness, deceit, debauchery, envy, slander, arrogance, and foolishness. All these evils come from within, and these are what defile a man. Mark 7:20-23.
Jesus says here that it is the sin in the heart of man that causes him to err in thought, word and deed.
In other words, man sins precisely because he is a sinner from the outset. We do not become sinners, we are sinners.
If we examine ourselves sincerely, we know that not a day goes by without our falling short both before God and our fellow men. And when we examine ourselves, we should be aware that it is not only what we do that can be sinful, but also what we do not do can be just as serious. Our failure to do good is a great sin.
Because of all this, the heavy reality is this: the great wrath of God rests heavily on every unrepentant sinner, John 3:36.
The wrath of God
A very common misconception of God in our time is that he is loving and good and not much more. But the Bible does not give us such a simple and primitive notion of God.
God is also holy and righteous. And always the wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness. Rom 1:18.
Therefore, as long as the earth last, humanity will suffer by God’s judgments of wrath: wars, plagues, pandemics, famines, droughts, floods, tsunamis, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, hurricanes, delusions, sexual perversions, and other horrors.
This message about God is found in both the Old and New Testaments. It is a myth that the Bible speaks of two gods: a good god in the New Testament and an evil god in the Old Testament. No, the Bible speaks of one God who is eternally unchanging.
The Bible’s clear answers
The Bible is a realistic book that does not shy away from the cold hard reality. It is a book that openly reveals the toxic ingredients of the boiling cauldron that is our world.
And we have now seen that the Bible gives us a clear answer to the question about God and the evil of the world that opened this chapter. The answer is found in these four realities:
* Man’s constant apostasy from God and his Word.
* The strong and destructive power of sin.
* The constant activity of the evil one.
* The wrath of God on an apostate world.
These have characterized the history of the world from the day of the Fall. And in these realities the Bible gives us keys to a deeper understanding of all suffering and evil in the world.
This chapter has been about something almost unbearably dark and depressing. But as a Christian, it would be dishonest not to share everything the Bible teaches, but only to select what is positive and pleasant.
It is necessary to accept even the dark and gloomy part of the Bible’s message if we are to properly understand and appreciate the bright and good message that we will tell you about in chapter 6. But before that, let’s talk about the most important person in history.
CHAPTER 5
JESUS CHRIST
Everything we can touch or look at has a beginning; indeed, everything on earth and in the universe has a definite starting point.
But this is not the case with Christ. It is impossible to understand, but the Bible teaches that Christ has always existed, John 17:5. He has no beginning and no end. He is like the Father – from eternity to eternity.
“Truly, truly, I tell you,” Jesus declared, “before Abraham was born, I am! (John 8:58) This Jesus said to the amazement of the people. For Abraham lived about 2000 years before Jesus.
The unique birth of Jesus
But when the time had fully come, God sent His Son. Gal 4:4.
The Son came to earth from heaven where he had been in eternal fellowship with the Father (John 17:5).
Christ came in a way that was mysterious and unique to the world. It is called ’the virgin birth’. It means that his mother Mary became pregnant through the work of the Holy Spirit.
In other words, neither Joseph (Mary’s betrothed), nor any other man, had any part in this. We get a glimpse of the miracle through this Bible verse:
This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged in marriage to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit. Matt 1:18
The fact that it was the Holy Spirit and not a man who was behind the birth of Jesus means that Jesus was untainted by human sin from the start. And thus he could become the perfect sacrifice required for the atonement of the world (Hebrews 7:26-27).
Jesus as a little child
Jesus was born in an inn somewhere in Bethlehem. Joseph and Mary had been forced to go there because of a tax assessment ordered by the Roman occupying power.
It was also there, on the slopes of Bethlehem, that some shepherds saw the heavens open and an innumerable host of angels praise God for the birth of the Savior, Luke 2:8-20.
But other powers were also at work. The powers of evil knew from the beginning that the holy Son of God had come, and through the cruel Herod (King of Judea) tried to do everything possible to kill him.
But through the intervention of angels, Joseph and Mary were able to flee with the baby Jesus to Egypt. There they stayed as refugees for some time. After Herod’s death, the family returned to Israel, where they settled in their hometown of Nazareth. There, Jesus grew up with his father, mother and siblings.
Jesus as a boy
It didn’t take long for people to realize that there was something special about Jesus. Already at the age of twelve they were amazed at his intellect, Luke 2:41-52.
But the Bible is otherwise very silent about Jesus’ life until his public ministry began when he was about thirty years old (Luke 3:23). But before that he spent time with his family and was obedient to his parents. He probably went to school like any other boy, and learned there, above all, the Holy Scriptures. And we read that he followed in his father’s footsteps by working as a carpenter/craftsman, Luke 2:51-52, Mark 6:3.
Jesus as a man
Jesus was in a way ordinary but at the same time extraordinary. In the 33 years or so of his life, he experienced what this world has to offer, just like the rest of us. He was no stranger to hunger, thirst, joy, tears, upset or pain.
But unlike the rest of us, his whole life was a sinless and perfect life. The absence of sin in Jesus’ heart meant that everything he thought, said and did was in accordance with God’s love and holiness.
Jesus among the people
… the Dawn will visit us from on high, to shine on those who live in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the path of peace … Luke 1:78-79.
Jesus’ public ministry among men lasted three or four years. And it was a very special time, without any parallel in world history. It is about these years that the four Gospels of the New Testament are mainly concerned.
Jesus’ ministry among people was characterized by compassion and righteousness. And words and deeds always went hand in hand when it came to Jesus. His message was so fused with himself that he embodied his own teachings.
All kinds of people were drawn to Jesus: outcasts and the poor and those who were considered particularly sinful at the time, but also rich people and those in high positions. Jesus spread truth, light and the warmth of love to all who were open to him and his words.
But Jesus was not weak and timid. What he could not tolerate and what aroused his anger was the religious hypocrisy that was rife. He abhorred worship and piety that was not from the heart and true. He didn’t pull back to let the whip flap in the air above them who profaned the sacred, John 2:13-17, Matt 21:12-13. And people’s unbelief could sometimes upset and frustrate him, Matt 17:17.
The miracles of Jesus
He performed many miracles and signs, including those that no one before or after him had done. He went walking on wild waves to the disciples who were in distress at sea. He blessed a few fish and bread to feed thousands of hungry people. In a boat in the middle of the sea, he calmed a strong storm with a few words. He healed many sick people and freed many who were tormented by evil and unclean spirits. He raised dead people.
He has done all things well, the people said of him. Mark 7:37.
Jesus’ teaching
Jesus spoke and taught like no other. The Bible says vividly and aptly: all the people hung on His words. Luke 19:48.
In Jesus there was a fire to proclaim everywhere: I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns as well, because that is why I was sent. Luke 4:43.
His preaching of the Kingdom of God is inexhaustible in content, as are his many parables, which are literary gems. He was the Truth who preached the Truth with great power, John 18:37.
The people were astonished at His teaching, because He taught as one who had authority, and not as the scribes. Mark 1:22.
But the most astonishing thing is all the extraordinary things he said about himself. Think for a moment, what kind of person can speak of himself in this way:
I am the bread of life … I am the light of the world … I am the door … I am the good shepherd … I am the way and the truth and the life … John 6:35, 41, 48-51, 57-58, 8:12, 10:1-30, 14:6.
In the New Testament there are many more similar examples. No one in the history of the world has made such claims as Jesus. Anyone facing such claims is forced to take a stand.
Was he who he claimed to be, or was he the greatest and most successful liar in history? For those who believe that Jesus’ claims are true, there are of course life-changing consequences.
Jesus is indeed challenging. His words and actions shatter all the natural laws and orders of this world. In him we encounter the mighty powers of the heavenly world. The kingdom of God swept forth in the person and work of Jesus.
Jesus certainly did a lot in the few years he was on earth. Open the four Gospels of the New Testament and read about him. You will be amazed and will not be able to compare this to anything else you have read, because there is no one in history who can be compared to Jesus.
The suffering and death of Jesus
The unimaginable thing is that Jesus’ life ended in a cruel and sudden death. A bitterly painful path was marked out for him. Along the way he faced anguish, betrayal, humiliation, insults, beatings, floggings, and finally the cross, a Roman instrument of torture that meant a slow and very painful death.
So people finally came to cry out against the innocent man who had done nothing but good: Crucify Him! Mark 15:11-15. Here we encounter human evil in all its nakedness and pushed to its extreme. We witness the world of darkness in confrontation with him who came from the world of light and is himself the Light, John 3:19.
The result of this confrontation was that man, in blindness and with refined cruelty, killed Love and Righteousness incarnate.
Adam and Eve disobeyed God. And several thousand years later, on Calvary, we see their descendants go one step further – they killed the Son of God.
As Jesus hung there abandoned on the cross, everything looked hopeless for his disciples, nobody understood anything. They were now just discouraged, afraid and confused. Yet Jesus had spoken to them several times about his death and resurrection as his real mission here on earth. Yet they could never have imagined such a humiliating end for their teacher. They were still blind, because Jesus’ mission was still hidden from them.
Resurrection of Jesus
Jesus, the Son of God, was crucified and killed, then taken down from the cross and laid in a tomb. But three days later, something happened that has only happened once in history. He who was dead was given life again, never to die again. God raised his Son from death. It was impossible for death to keep him who was Life itself, John 11:25, Acts 3:15. And many saw and experienced the risen Christ, read about it in Matt 28, Luke 24, John 20-21, 1 Cor 15:4-8.
On one occasion about 60 years after the resurrection, Jesus appeared to his disciple John, who was then imprisoned on an island because of his faith. Jesus met a trembling apostle with words radiant with hope:
Do not be afraid. I am the First and the Last, the Living One. I was dead, and behold, now I am alive forever and ever! And I hold the keys of Death and of Hades. Rev 1:17-18.
There is much in the Bible that is difficult to understand. We often move in a spiritual, supernatural and in many ways mysterious world. But when we enter the realm of faith, we gain new eyes and a new mind. Faith accepts. And faith in the biblical sense means a firm trust and confidence in God and his word.
Then, no one can fail to be amazed at the total change that Jesus’ disciples underwent after they met the risen Lord. From being terrified disciples after the crucifixion, fearing for their lives, they suddenly turn into bold preachers who begin a worldwide mission. And many would be martyred.
Christianity rests on this historical foundation that God raised his Son from the dead from a tomb in Jerusalem almost two thousand years ago. And through this resurrection, God confirms to humanity that Jesus is the unique and beloved Son of God, and that Jesus’ teachings constitute God’s credible message to all peoples and countries of the world.
40 days
After his bodily resurrection, Jesus appeared several times to his apostles. We read that he appeared to them for 40 days and then taught them, Acts 1:3, 10:40-41, 13:30-31. Much of that teaching can be found in the New Testament today.
The Ascension
After he had taught the apostles a little over a month, there was what we call the ’ascension’, Acts 1:6-11. This is when Jesus was taken up to heaven to be with his Father again. That’s where Jesus is today.
Who was He?
Many answers have been given, but not all of them are based on biblical teaching. Some speak of him as if he were merely a prophet, or a great charismatic teacher and religion founder, or a major religious reformer. But the truth is considerably greater. Let us briefly look at what the New Testament says about the person of Jesus.
Jesus is the Messiah/Christ
The word Messiah comes from a Hebrew word meaning ’the anointed one’. Prophets, priests and especially kings were anointed with oil before their divine office. The Greek equivalent of Messiah is Christ.
According to the New Testament, it is Jesus who is the Christ (Luke 2:11), i.e. the fulfillment of all the promises of the Messiah in the Old Testament.
Jesus was the Messiah, but not the kind of Messiah the people of Jesus’ day generally hoped for. The Jews usually thought of the Messiah as a powerful political leader, with military overtones. They were waiting for a Messiah who would liberate the people from the Romans and create a mighty kingdom of peace.
For this reason, Jesus often chose to call himself ’the Son of Man’. But for his disciples, the dawn was nevertheless becoming clearer. Slowly, they began to understand that Jesus was the promised Messiah.
But it was only after Jesus’ resurrection that his disciples fully understood that Jesus was the true Messiah, a humble Messiah who meant well to all (not just to the people of Israel) and whose primary task was to suffer and die for the whole human race.
Jesus is the Son of God
This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. Listen to Him! Matt 17:5.
These words were heard by some of Jesus’ disciples when they were with him on a high mountain. It was God the Father who gave his testimony. Even when Jesus was baptized, the Father called him ”my Son”, Matt 3:17.
Jesus being the Son of God means that he is not only human, but also divine and stands in a unique relationship with the Father and that they share the same essence.
Read more about the relationship between the Father and the Son in John 5:19-23.
Jesus is God
Jesus says: I and the Father are one. John 10:30.
And: All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me. Matt 28:18.
And who is not filled with wonder at these words about Jesus:
For in Him all things were created, things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities. All things were created through Him and for Him. He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. Col 1:16-17
Who is he who is one with the Father and has all authority? Who is he that is participating in the work of creation, and sustains all things by life, and exists before all things?
The Apostle John gives us a clear and straightforward answer in a text where Jesus is called ”the Word”:
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God … The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us. We have seen His glory, the glory of the one and only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth … No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son, who is Himself God and is at the Father’s side, has made Him known. John 1:1, 14, 18
It is a great mystery, but Jesus is ’true God and true man’, as a classic formulation goes.
We have now read about Jesus’ life and identity, and about his death and resurrection. But the question that becomes increasingly pressing is: Why did Jesus, the Son of God, have to come to earth to suffer, die, and rise again? We’ll let the Bible answer that now.
CHAPTER 6
PEACE WITH GOD
Chapter 4 was like a cold night dealing with sin and God’s wrath. But now the morning will dawn, the heat will come, and the birds will finally start singing, because now we will look at God’s answer to the world – the Gospel and the atonement.
Gospel means ’good news’, because it is about the atonement, and the atonement is the priceless treasure given to the world in and through the death and resurrection of Jesus.
It is finished
Just seconds before his death, Jesus cried out in a loud voice something very strange. In the midst of this darkness where three crosses were raised, Jesus spoke words that are almost shocking:
It is finished. John 19:30.
Those words have an infinite depth and content that no human being can grasp.
What was finished on the cross was a divine and eternal plan realized in history.
Christ’s death was certainly not a tragic mistake in which a good man, under unfortunate circumstances, was innocently convicted and punished. No, it was a predetermined plan of God to save the world. A plan before the creation of the world. It is about the atonement.
Isaiah’s prophecy
There is a deep divine wisdom hidden in what happened at Golgotha (a place just outside Jerusalem) about 2,000 years ago. The Bible can open our eyes and allow us to see a glimpse of all that really happened. Let us first look at a text from the Old Testament:
Surely He took on our infirmities and carried our sorrows; yet we considered Him stricken by God, struck down and afflicted. But He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed. We all like sheep have gone astray, each one has turned to his own way; and the LORD has laid upon Him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed and afflicted, yet He did not open His mouth. He was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is silent, so He did not open His mouth. Isaiah 53:4-7.
This amazing prediction was written some 700 years before the birth of Jesus. God reveals through the prophet Isaiah what would happen through this person who was understood much later to refer to Jesus Christ.
The testimony of the New Testament
It is the New Testament that above all gives us the meaning of the atonement. That is why we are going to read some texts from it. We should take our time and let the words sink into our hearts:
Jesus Christ, the Righteous One. He Himself is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world. 1 John 2:1-2
God was reconciling the world to Himself in Christ. 2 Cor 5:19
God proves His love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Therefore, since we have now been justified by His blood, how much more shall we be saved from wrath through Him! Rom 5:8-9
What these Bible texts are about in different ways is this: Christ’s atonement gives us peace with God. It means that God and man meet in a loving relationship through Jesus Christ, the propitiator.
Jesus the sacrificial lamb
A key to a better understanding of what atonement is all about is the teaching on sacrifice that appears in the Old Testament and which the New Testament also spins on.
During the time of the Old Covenant, God had ordained various kinds of sacrifices. And above all, it was when people had sinned that it was important that sacrifices were made. And the high priest, the supreme spiritual leader and representative of the people, had as his most important task to offer sacrifices once a year to atone for the sin and guilt of the whole people, Leviticus 16.
Through these sin and guilt offerings, sins were atoned for before God. A little simplified, the process was like this:
* God and man lives in harmony.
* But then he sins by breaking God’s law, and God’s wrath is aroused.
* The sinner can then seek atonement by sacrificing in faith.
* God then let his wrath to fall on the innocent and faultless sacrifice instead of the sinner.
* Thereby atonement is established, and again there is peace and love between God and man.
With the guilt- and sin offerings we read about in the Old Testament, God wanted to show how seriously he views sin, and also to show that atonement must take place so that the sinner does not remain forever under the wrath.
An innocent must take the place of the guilty and give his blood in order for peace and friendship to be restored between God and man.
But according to the New Testament, all these sacrifices were of a temporary nature. They were only a shadow of what God had determined would become a reality in and through Jesus. Jesus was to be the sacrificial lamb that God, not man, would offer.
Everything in the Old Testament about sacrifice is meant to point to the perfect sacrifice that God had determined from the beginning – Jesus Christ.
Jesus, according to John the Baptist, was the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! John 1:29
And Paul could write: Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. 1 Cor 5:7
And in heaven Jesus is praised forever for all that he, the slain Lamb, has done for mankind, Rev 5:9-12.
So one reason why Jesus must die is that God’s justice and righteousness demand it. Someone has to pay the debt for us. Someone has to take the punishment instead of us, Rom 3:25-26.
The God of love
The Bible testifies quite often that God is love. Love is his essence. Love is not outside God or created by him but he IS love. All true and pure love has its source in God.
We have seen how God dealt with sinful humanity. He did not allow the human race to be punished for eternity. No, the biblical texts speak a different language, a language of grace and love.
It is incomprehensible, but one reason for Jesus’ brutal atoning death on the cross is God’s love. God’s loving heart pulsed forth the atonement:
For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that everyone who believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him. John 3:16-17.
Out of love for a lost world, God sent his Son to us in the darkness of death to lead us to the light of life. Christ’s atonement opened a way for every human being to fellowship with the God of love.
It is because of Jesus’ atonement that we no longer need to fear God’s wrath. We can now be confident that God loves us from the moment the gospel and the atonement become a reality in our lives.
It was for you
We have now tasted a little of the mystery of the atonement and of the fruits of Jesus’ suffering, death and resurrection. And we have been able to see that the atonement has cosmic dimensions, the whole world is embraced by the arms of atonement. But in the world also each individual, the atonement concerns you and me.
The most powerful words and perhaps the most enigmatic words ever spoken are those of Jesus: It is finished. John 19:30.
These words shook and changed the whole world. That’s because they were spoken by a special man at a special time, in a special place (the cross) and in a special context.
But a question now hanging in the air, waiting to be answered, is this: How should a person receive Jesus’ atonement? Or more to the point: How is a person saved? We will tell you now.
CHAPTER 7
SALVATION AND FAITH
Unless God first calls and works and touches the heart, a man can never find the way of salvation. Jesus said:
Everyone the Father gives Me will come to Me … No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him. John 6:37, 44.
God wants the salvation of all people, and an encounter with the Gospel message – in any form – can always be seen as a call of God.
God calls, but the Bible also urge every human being, not to be defiant or indifferent, but to respond to God’s call by receiving salvation and atonement. Those who do so belong to those chosen by God before creation. They are the people of the new covenant, God’s own people, Eph 1:14, Titus 2:14, 1 Peter 2:9.
About salvation
The word salvation is a word rich in content. To be saved and redeemed is the most important thing for a man in the short time he lives on earth.
Jesus says: What will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul? Matt 16:26.
We will clarify what God’s salvation means. For the person who is saved and reconciled through Jesus, the following happens:
* He is saved here and now and for all eternity from the wrath of God,
* from the dark powers of evil,
* from eternal hell and the lake of fire.
* He is saved here and now and for all eternity to a life in God’s love and grace,
* to the forgiveness of sins,
* to the security and joy of being a child of God,
* to the knowledge of the truth,
* to paradise and eternal life in heaven.
We’ll look at the Bible’s answer to how we personally share in this salvation. But first, let’s look at a well-worn and wide road that doesn’t lead there.
A common thought is that everything is fine if you just try to be a good person all the time. Maybe you even go to church once in a while. That’s all well and good, but it’s possible to live a religious life and still miss the most important thing. That’s the case for some people today, and it was the case in Jesus’ day.
Pharisees and Scribes
In Jesus’ day, there was a strict religious party called the Pharisees. There were also the scribes who were teachers and taught the Holy Scriptures. These people had an unshakable and self-evident faith in God. A faith that they had carried with them since childhood.
They knew the Scriptures and could recite passages by heart. They prayed regularly. They gave money to the needy and did other good deeds. They wanted well and strove with all their might to do good. They believed that if they took all God’s commandments seriously and really tried to live by them, they would please God.
But despite all this, many were far from salvation, and Jesus often came down hard on them (Matt 23). Why did he do this? Because they tried to gain salvation by relying on their own piety. On their own power and ability.
They could not and would not see themselves as sinners in need of a Savior. They thought they were good enough through all the religious activity in which they lived. They could not therefore accept Jesus who wanted people to turn their hearts to him first and foremost.
Jesus became for them a threat to the way of salvation that they themselves had created. Jesus said to the Jewish leaders:
You pore over the Scriptures because you presume that by them you possess eternal life. These are the very words that testify about Me, yet you refuse to come to Me to have life. John 5:39-40.
Neither the scribes nor the Pharisees understood Jesus. They did not see who he was. Nor did they understand why he had come. Instead, Jesus faced hatred from many of them, and a dark threat of death from these extremely religious people came to hang over Jesus.
We cannot save ourselves
It is impossible for a man to accomplish anything before God that would please Him to give forgiveness of sins and eternal life. No one can earn salvation by his own ability. If that were possible, Jesus would be superfluous. We don’t need Jesus if we can be strong, powerful and pious enough ourselves. The Apostle Paul puts it this way:
I do not set aside the grace of God. For if righteousness comes through the law, Christ died for nothing. Gal 2:21
In other words, if it is so that we can live a pious life by our own power and thus be loved by God, then Christ died in vain and no atonement is needed and God’s grace becomes something empty and useless.
A religious life without Jesus Christ the Savior, however pious it may seem, will always represent the broad road that leads away from God.
Faith
Now we will finally look at the path of salvation that the Bible paints for us in bold.
What we must first realize is that the Bible forcefully states that salvation is a gift from God. This gift is of grace. Because of our sin and guilt, none of us deserves anything but eternal damnation from a holy God. But grace means that God gives us good gifts without our deserving it.
Then we need to know that we share in this gift of grace by simply receiving it.
This happens through faith in Jesus Christ.
Faith activates the atonement in our personal lives. Faith in Jesus leads us into the arms of God. Faith means that God receives us and surrounds us with warm love and grace. And we are safely enclosed in God’s arms as long as we live by faith – loved with everlasting love.
The Bible is crystal clear: faith in Christ is the path God has laid out for us humans. Time and again, the Bible conveys the way of faith as man’s only salvation. Some examples:
Whoever believes in Him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe has already been condemned, because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son. John 3:18.
Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life. Whoever rejects the Son will not see life. Instead, the wrath of God remains on him. John 3:36.
Since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Rom 5:1.
The crowds asked Jesus:
“What must we do to perform the works of God?” Jesus replied, “The work of God is this: to believe in the One He has sent.” John 6:28-29.
God has not made it complicated for us, and he does not require any difficult and heavy performance on our part before he can accept us:
For it is by grace you have been saved through faith, and this not from yourselves; it is the gift of God, not by works, so that no one can boast. Eph 2:8-9.
If you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with your heart you believe and are justified, and with your mouth you confess and are saved. Rom 10:9-10
One text above says that ”we have been justified through faith” in Jesus Christ. This does not mean that through faith we have been transformed into finished or perfect people. But it does mean that, despite our flaws and failings, we are always regarded by God as acquitted and placed in a right and good relationship with Him. This happens because we believers have received God’s righteousness in Jesus Christ (Rom 3:21-26, Phil 3:8-9).
The true Faith
When the Bible speaks of faith/believe, it is not something vague or diffuse. Nor is it an assumption like ”I believe it will rain tomorrow”.
No, faith in the biblical sense means trust, confidence and an inner conviction.
And when a person believes in Jesus Christ, it always means the following according to the New Testament:
1. Believing in the Jesus that the New Testament describes: Jesus as Lord, Son of God and Savior of the world.
2. Believing in the atonement that Jesus accomplished through his death and resurrection.
Christ and the Commandments
But what about the Commandments if it is all about faith? The answer is that it is only faith in Jesus Christ that gives us salvation, not some demanding commandments. Christ has done everything for us, and there is nothing man can do except believe in the grace of God in Jesus Christ.
But once we have come to faith, God wants us to live according to his will. The Commandments, too, then have a given place in our lives. God’s Commandments and teachings become our joy. They are good and holy Commandments that we should always strive to live by. God wants our lives to abound in good works, Col 1:10, Titus 2:14, 3:8, 14, Hebr 10:24.
But without faith, everything goes wrong. No matter how adorned a way of life is with good works of love, it does not please God if Christ is left out.
Baptism
In the Bible we see that baptism and faith are intimately intertwined. Wherever baptism is mentioned, faith is always present. It is therefore natural to include the important meaning of baptism in the message about faith.
Baptism is a symbolic act, but not only that, something also happens in baptism. The following points summarize some of the Bible’s teaching:
* We confess through baptism that we are disciples of Christ and belong to his church.
* We are baptized into Christ, and thus consecrated to serve him.
* Baptism brings us from death to life. We are ’buried and raised’, so to speak, in the waters of baptism to a new life.
* Baptism involves a real but unimaginable union with Christ in his death and resurrection.
* Baptism in union with faith gives us forgiveness of sins and gives us the Holy Spirit.
When we read texts in the New Testament about baptism, we understand why Jesus – just before he left the disciples – was so keen to talk about the importance of baptism as well, Matt 28:18-19. Baptism is therefore something very essential and should take place as closely as possible to repentance and faith.
The Apostle Peter preached this powerfully about baptism when he spoke to a large crowd:
Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. This promise belongs to you and your children and to all who are far off—to all whom the Lord our God will call to Himself. Acts 2:38-39
Jesus is the only way
It is repulsive to many, but the Bible never shies away from the reality that Jesus Christ is the only way that leads to our Creator and God.
But many refuse to accept such an exclusive claim. And in the world we encounter sects and cults that proclaim various ”truths” they believe they have found.
And many falsely and dangerously proclaim that all major world religions worship the same god and lead to the same end.
Just as the serpent lured Adam and Eve away from the word of God, he is trying to deceive and confuse even today, and in many forms.
Jesus saw what was coming and knew that the eternal good of man was at stake, so he warned:
See to it that no one deceives you … For false Christs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and wonders that would deceive even the elect, if that were possible. Matt 24:4, 24
The disciple Thomas once asked Jesus where the way to God and heaven was. Jesus answered in plain language and with words that no one else dared to speak:
I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. John 14:6.
The apostles passed on the same message, they proclaimed about Jesus:
Salvation exists in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved. Acts 4:12, see also 1 Tim 2:5.
A Prayer
We have now read about the Gospel, the message of atonement and the way of faith. Every person who encounters that message is faced with a choice.
You too, who are now reading this, are faced with a choice. If you want, you can come to God as you are. You do not have to change yourself first. The Spirit wants to carry you to the heart of God. Jesus Christ wants to be your good shepherd. Turn to the Savior and you will enter God’s love.
This prayer is intended to help you if you find it difficult to formulate a prayer yourself. First read it through so you understand it, and then pray it with your heart.
I thank you, Jesus Christ, for dying and rising also for my sake. I confess my sins to you and want to receive forgiveness. Thank you God my Father that I am now loved by You. Thank You for the gift of eternal life. And thank You that You now dwell in me through the Holy Spirit and are with me all the days, Amen.
If you have prayed with a sincere heart, from this moment you can boldly confess that you belong to God.
This first tentative step of faith and prayer sets you on the road of life. But a road is made for walking. The new life of faith requires constant walking. Let’s look at what this new life with God means.
CHAPTER 8
LIFE WITH GOD
Repentance
Repentance is about getting a new and healthy mind, and turning away from the works of darkness and the sins of the past.
Through repentance and faith you have been ”born again”, John 3:3. You are like a little child, but you do not walk alone. You are now surrounded by the Father’s love. Jesus is now your shepherd. And you now share in the Holy Spirit who helps you.
Remain in me
Life with God is about our growth, maturity and bearing good fruit. In the New Testament, the new life with God can be expressed in several ways. Here we will start from Jesus’ parable of the vine. Jesus said:
Remain in Me, and I will remain in you. Just as no branch can bear fruit by itself unless it remains in the vine, neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in Me. I am the vine and you are the branches. The one who remains in Me, and I in him, will bear much fruit. For apart from Me you can do nothing. John 15:4-5.
We will now look a little closer at what it means to ’remain in Christ’.
Church fellowship
Those who remain in Christ belong to his church. God’s church is not made up of church buildings and membership cards.
The church is a community of converted people on a journey with a common goal. It is a family where worship is central and where everyone is guided by faith, hope and love.
It is through faith in Jesus Christ that God incorporates us into his church.
We need fellowship with God’s people in the place where we live. These are evil times and we often need each other’s prayers, care and encouragement. In addition, we should come together regularly to listen to men who preach and teach from the Word of God.
In addition, every believer has a role to play in the church. We should therefore serve each other with the gifts of the Spirit that God has given to the church, 1 Cor 12, Rom 12:4-8.
A true community of faith is one in which people confess the Father and the Son and the Spirit, believe the Bible as the trustworthy word of God, and seek to live by it in doctrine and life.
The Eucharist
Remaining in Christ also means partaking of the Eucharist, which is something of the heart of the worship service. As the people of the new covenant, we need to gather regularly around the Eucharist instituted by Jesus, Matt 26:26-30.
We then share in Jesus Christ through the bread and wine. And each time we partake of Christ’s body and blood, we remind one another of – and proclaim – the reality of the atonement, the sacrificial death of Jesus, 1 Cor 11:23-24.
And where Christ is, there is forgiveness of sins, and where forgiveness is, there is abundant thanksgiving. We therefore thank God in the Eucharist for the death of Christ which took place once for all and which gives us life continually. In the Eucharist, what is concrete and present meets us together with the mystery.
Bible reading
Remaining in Christ also means communing with the Holy Scriptures:
Let the word of Christ richly dwell within you. Col 3:16.
For everything that was written in the past was written for our instruction, so that through endurance and the encouragement of the Scriptures, we might have hope. Rom 15:4.
It is only when a person becomes a believer and partakes of the Spirit that the opportunity exists to properly take in the message of the Bible, 1 Cor 2:14, Luke 24:45.
The Bible opens the door to a new world. Entirely new expanses and landscapes are opened. For us believers, it is natural and obvious to find out how this new world is organized and see what rules and freedoms apply there.
The best advice is to start by reading through the New Testament a few times before delving into the Old Testament.
Be assured that many discoveries will be made. A whole new worldview and view of man will take shape. New thoughts and concepts will shape the world of the mind.
Another reason for studying the Bible is that we can then more easily expose false teachings. When heresies comes knocking at the door of the church – or if it is already in the midst of the congregation – we need to know the Scriptures. The Bible often calls us to stand up for the truth and the doctrine.
Prayer
Remaining in Christ also means that a new and living relationship has been established. Fellowship with God means faith, knowledge and obedience. But all of that can easily become cold if there is not a more intimate fellowship. And the main thing that creates such a relationship is conversation. And prayer is conversation with God.
There is tremendous power and force in prayer, and that is of course because it is to the almighty God that prayer is addressed. Prayer can therefore set enormous forces in motion. But there is no automaticity in prayer. Neither ’right faith’ nor special formulations make God answer prayer.
But it is safe to know that God knows our heart and responds solely out of grace and love. And far from always God gives us the answer that we might have wanted. But somehow God always answers the one who prays sincerely.
When we pray, we share in great promises. For example, this from the Apostle Peter: Cast all your anxiety on Him, because He cares for you. 1 Peter 5:7.
A common kind of anxiety can be physical or mental illness. But when we are sick in body or mind, we can turn to God, lay out our desires and concerns, and pray that God’s will be done.
God can miraculously heal even in our time. And doctors and medicines also serve as God’s instruments. But we should be aware that it is only in the world of perfection (heaven) that we will be completely freed from all physical and mental disorders and diseases.
God knows what is best for us and therefore our prayer should always be characterized by humility, trust and gratitude.
During his time on earth, Jesus often prayed to his Father. And in his teachings, he often addressed the importance of prayer, emphasizing both individual and communal prayer.
Simply and bluntly, Jesus said: Whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours. Mark 11:24.
This is a promise we are keen to build on. And we may do so. But in all understanding of the Bible, it is important to be sound in faith and take into account everything the Bible teaches, in this case about prayer. To all those who want to misuse the words of Jesus, the Bible says: And when you do ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may squander it on your pleasures. James 4:3.
Jesus himself has for all time given us a model example of how we should pray in the text found in Matt 6:5-15.
Sanctification/Holiness
By remaining in Christ, we want to live a life that pleases God. Living like this is sanctification. Believers are often referred to in the Bible as the saints. This means that God has brought us out of darkness and into a close relationship with Himself. We now belong to God and his kingdom and not to this world. That is why we are saints.
But we who are saints are also called to live a holy and righteous life, because a faith that does not have moral and ethical consequences is a dead faith. That is why the Bible calls us to work out our salvation (Phil 2:12), a work that can also be called sanctification/holiness (2 Cor 7:1, 1 Thess 4:3, 7, Hebr 12:14).
There is a constant process going on in the believer as God works good in us through His Spirit. Without God’s grace and the Spirit’s help, we cannot take a single step on the path of sanctification.
In the New Testament, we encounter everywhere moral exhortations that we are called to follow. In general, we are to avoid everything in life that can negatively affect our relationship with God and that risks grieving God’s Holy Spirit who lives in us, Eph 4:30.
Love
If the branch remains in the tree of love – Christ, the fruit also becomes love for God and our neighbor. As Jesus has loved us, we are called to love one another. And Jesus’ love was forgiving and serving.
A loving thought, a loving word, an act done in love. Such things please God more than anything else that happens under the sun. There is nothing greater we can do than to spread the fragrance of love around us.
Feel free to read the well-known and beautiful passage in 1 Cor 13, which is a poetic hymn about love.
God gives us different kinds of gifts, but love is greatest, and only the qualities of love last forever, because God is love!
We can be in the community of faith, in the Eucharist, in prayer, in mission, and be strong in our biblical faith, but if the tone of love cannot be perceived in everything we do, then we have not yet matured as Christians.
Jesus mentioned the following commandments as the most important: Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength … Love your neighbor as yourself. No other commandment is greater than these. Mark 12:30-31.
And listen to the classic words of Jesus, which can also be seen as a kind of summary of the whole law of the Old Testament:
In everything, then, do to others as you would have them do to you. For this is the essence of the Law and the Prophets. Matt 7:12
It is this principle of love that should guide us as we remain in Christ.
Forbidden love
True love is not unrestrained, but has a definite framework given to us by our Creator in the Holy Scriptures. By reading Scripture, we learn what true and real love is.
But if God’s word is abandoned, it will be man himself who decides in what forms love can be expressed. And then many things will be permitted in the name of love, even things which the Bible forbids and which are abominable before God.
When it comes to sex and relationships, our Creator has given us a clear framework in which this is allowed. The Bible calls this framework marriage, which according to God is a covenant between a man and a woman (Matthew 19:3-9). Sex is a good gift from God for our well-being. But sex outside the covenant of marriage meets with God’s disapproval and risks our health.
Being witnesses
By remaining in Christ, we become witnesses for him. It is natural that the one who has been snatched away from the fire should want to be involved in saving others from the threatening flames. It is therefore natural that God’s people have a desire to bring the message of salvation to a lost humanity.
Life with God is not just something personal, a private matter that we should keep to ourselves.
Evangelism and mission always have the main goal of reaching people with the gospel message. Which of course does not exclude social efforts.
Before God, we are primarily responsible for the city and country where we live. But with prayers and gifts we also want to support the worldwide mission.
After his resurrection, Jesus gave his Great Commission to his disciples. His words are also valid for those who want to follow him today:
Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me. Therefore go and make disciplesd of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey all that I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Matt 28:18-20
Summary
Since our ”life is now hidden with Christ in God” (Col 3:3), we are beyond logic if we try to understand this life. But we try to summarize so far:
In order to partake of divine nourishment, to begin to sprout and grow, and then to blossom and bear fruit, we need to ”remain in Christ,” the vine.
To remain in Christ is to live in faith and obedience to the Word of God. It is we ourselves who are called to realize all that we have written about. And it is equally true that it is not by own power that we can do this.
All the loving and good things we do, have the grace of God and the Spirit of Jesus as their source, ’for apart from me you can do nothing’, Jesus said in his parable of the vine and the branches.
CHAPTER 9
ENEMIES AND FRIENDS OF FAITH
We continue to talk about life with God and what it means. We will now touch on the battle that every believer has to fight against three enemies: Satan and sin and the world.
But we will also be reminded of the friends who are on our side besides the Father and the Son, i.e. the Spirit and the angels.
The road to heaven, the road of faith, is not an easy or comfortable one. And the Bible and church history testify that life with God is not a fun game. External suffering, such as persecution and martyrdom, has marked the path of believers throughout history. In 2023, 365 million Christians worldwide were persecuted for their faith (Open Doors World Watch List 2024). And inner suffering, such as anxiety and depression, is experienced by many believers. Sometimes throughout their lives. Jesus said to his followers: In the world you will have tribulation. And the apostles said to the believers: We must endure many hardships to enter the kingdom of God. John 16:33, Acts 14:22.
As long as we are on earth, we all share in the pain of being human in a fallen world under God’s judgment. A world where dark powers also have their seat. Indeed, life with God itself leads us into a more direct confrontation with these powers. If we are not aware of this and prepared for it, we can easily end up in confusion and then, in the worst case, lose faith when such trials hit us with force.
We will now open the curtain to take a closer look at our enemies.
Satan is our enemy
It is shocking, but the Bible teaches that the whole world is under the power of the evil one. 1 John 5:19. So there is an evil hyper-intelligent spirit infiltrating every country and city in the world with its own destructive presence.
Satan’s ultimate goal is to deceive mankind and lead us away from God and His Word so that we also are drawn to the place (the lake of fire) prepared for Satan himself and his demons.
Compared to God, Satan is a speck of dust, in every sense, yet he has been given his appointed time by God to work, and he wreaks great havoc.
But most importantly, Christ, through his atonement, has defeated the devil. And through faith in Jesus, we share in the victory he won, and the devil cannot touch those who belong to God.
But still, the demons are not horned jesters but evil realities that still tempt us and try to lure us away from life with God. We should therefore resist Satan by taking up the fight in earnest. The Apostle Paul urged:
Put on the full armor of God, so that you can make your stand against the devil’s schemes. Read Eph 6:11-18 about the armor that Paul urges us to constantly wear.
Sin is our enemy
Through faith we have become new creations and received forgiveness of our sins. But we are not yet sinless. Sin still clings to the heart. It is only at the day of total transformation, in heaven, that we will be completely cleansed from the poison of sin. But here on earth, we have to reckon with daily struggle against its strong essence within us.
Because we sin every day in thought, word and deed, we also need to live constantly in God’s forgiveness.
This is what John writes to people who have been believers for a long time:
If we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make Him out to be a liar, and His word is not in us. 1 John 1:7-10.
The World is our enemy
In Scripture, the world can refer to all the good things on earth that God created. It can also refer to the state as an institution, and the world in this sense is not an enemy, on the contrary. See Romans 13:1-7.
But the world can also, according to the New Testament, mean that spirit in the world which characterized by hostility to God. The world can be a society that despises and mocks what has to do with biblical morals, ethics and values.
Living ’worldly’ means a way of life that disregards God and his Word. It can take many forms. In the Western world, it is often uninhibited and normless sex, as well as excessive greed (Mammon) that characterize the worldly lifestyle.
Jesus prayed to his Father for his disciples:
I have given them Your word and the world has hated them; for they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. I am not asking that You take them out of the world, but that You keep them from the evil one. John 17:14-15.
The Apostle John exhorted the believers:
Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh, the desires of the eyes, and the pride of life—is not from the Father but from the world. The world is passing away, along with its desires; but whoever does the will of God remains forever. 1 John 2:15-17.
The Spirit is our friend
We are not fighting alone in the arena of life against our enemies. The Father and the Son are with the believer, John 14:23. Our friend the Holy Spirit is also on our side. Through the Spirit, God comes to us, as this text beautifully describes:
God has poured out His love into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, whom He has given us. Rom 5:5.
When Jesus left his own people, he said that ”another Helper” (or Advocate), would come to them. He spoke of the Spirit. And the Spirit is given to us through faith in Christ. The Holy Spirit embraces us, comforts us, and does everything to keep us in the tree of life – Christ.
It is through the Spirit that Jesus is present wherever his contemporary disciples are. Jesus’ promise is:
And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Advocate to be with you forever— the Spirit of truth. The world cannot receive Him, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him. But you do know Him, for He abides with you and will be in you. John 14:16-17.
The more we learn about the Spirit, the more we realize how dependent we are on Him to walk forward on the narrow way. Without the Spirit, we would immediately be torn apart by the fangs of our enemies.
Our friends the angels
And then we have our friends the angels. Although it is very rare for anyone to see an angel appear, we know that they are with us in our life with God. The good angels are our invisible friends who stand with us against all our enemies. The angels have many tasks and possess great power and strength. They are created beings who serve and praise God. They are also described as a kind of ministering spirits (Hebr 1:14) who help the believers here on earth in various ways (see e.g. Acts 12:6-11). We must not pray to them, but we can count on their presence and protection.
The security of Faith
We have seen that life with God by no means excludes difficulties and crises of various kinds. Yet, at the same time, it is a reality that every believer finds himself in the shadow of the Almighty, Ps 91:1. However we feel and in whatever situation we find ourselves, this is a true reality and something that instills security in our hearts.
A star of promise
It is only when it is dark enough that you can see and appreciate the stars. And in a dark world, there are many stars of promise in the Bible that light up the night.
One such star that has encouraged many is the words of Rom 8:18-39. The Bible text is about God’s love that does not turn away from the believer even under the darkest circumstances. Read that passage before moving on to the final chapter.
CHAPTER 10
THE END OF HISTORY AND THEREAFTER
The mighty cosmic machine will one day stop rolling. The history of this world is coming to an inevitable end.
Heaven and earth will pass away, Jesus said. Matt 24:35.
This last chapter will be about death, the coming of Jesus, the resurrection of man, judgment, eternity, the lake of fire and heaven. All this is known in theology as eschatology, which means ’the doctrine of the last things’.
The New Testament repeatedly urges us to look beyond the haze and darkness that brood over the earth, and to look instead to another world – the world of reality.
Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. Col 3:2.
Let’s start by looking at a subject that we all think about sometimes because it’s something we’re getting closer to every minute.
Death and beyond
It was sin that opened the door to death (Rom 5:12). And since no one is free from sin, no one can escape death either.
At about three weeks of age, when we were in the womb, our heart began to beat for the first time. But one day, the forces of death will stop the heartbeat. The life-giving warm blood will stop and the cold of death will conquer the limbs. The body will end up in a mortuary, and the end will be a cold grave or a few minutes in the crematorium oven.
What happens next, after death? Or, to put it more precisely, where is our soul before the day of resurrection and judgment?
The Bible does not let us live in uncertainty. We can mention, for example, Jesus’ words to the criminal who was hung on the cross next to Jesus. This criminal turned to Jesus in the last moments of his life and asked that Jesus at least ’think’ of him in the Kingdom of God.
But Jesus gave him much more than a thought. He promised him eternal fellowship in another world, and that within a few hours. Jesus said: Truly I tell you, today you will be with Me in Paradise. Luke 23:43
About the reality after death, we are also guided by Jesus’ powerful story of ’the rich man and Lazarus’ in Luke 16:19-31.
Through biblical texts like these, we understand that death can do us believers no harm. Death can frighten us and perhaps for a time strike us with pain and anguish. But once the jaws of death have swallowed us, we are with Christ in paradise.
On the other hand, those who turn their backs on the Savior Jesus Christ and thus lived with their sins unforgiven, are completely in the power of death and go to a place of torment.
It is also important to know that according to the Bible, after death there is no more possibility of repentance for anyone. The door of salvation is then closed forever. It is during our life on earth that it is decided what we will face after death.
The coming of Jesus Christ
The coming of Jesus – in great power and glory – is a central theme in the Bible. Most of the New Testament letters mention this.
The reality right now is that Jesus Christ is with his Father in heaven. At the same time, he is everywhere on earth through the Spirit.
But there will come a day when Jesus will visibly appear to the world. That day has been the hope of believers throughout the history of the Church of God.
There are biblical texts on this subject that are difficult to understand. That is also one reason why speculation has always flourished about the coming of Jesus.
At times, attempts have been made to set out a timetable for how everything will happen. There has been a lot of experimentation with numbers and years. But despite all the well-meaning attempts, it has always turned out that calculations and home-made schedules cannot be trusted. They have collapsed like houses of cards.
That’s because Scripture doesn’t provide an unified teaching of the exact course of Jesus’ coming. And Jesus himself said that no one knows the day when it will happen (Matt 24:36). Therefore, we must humbly approach this reality.
What is often and forcefully stated, however, is the very fact of his coming. Something that should therefore characterize the Church of God in all times is vigilance and waiting for the coming of Jesus.
We are now going to quote some Bible passages and we limit ourselves to the New Testament. Feel free to look up the passages and read the whole context, which always gives a better understanding. The first two quotes are from Jesus.
In My Father’s house are many rooms. If it 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 welcome you into My presence, so that you also may be where I am. John 14:2-3.
For just as the lightning comes from the east and flashes as far as the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man … and all the tribes of the earth will mourn. They will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven, with power and great glory … No one knows about that day or hour … Therefore keep watch, because you do not know the day on which your Lord will come. Matt 24:27, 30, 36, 42.
This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven. Acts 1:1.
This will take place when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with His mighty angels in blazing fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. They will suffer the penalty of eternal destruction, separated from the presence of the Lord and the glory of His might, on the day He comes to be glorified in His saints and regarded with wonder by all who have believed, including you who have believed our testimony. 2 Thess 1:7-10.
Through the Bible words above, we understand that history is every hour approaching a decisive stage. We also read in the Bible that what characterizes people up to the time of Christ’s coming is that they choose an increasingly ungodly path (Matt 24:3-13, 1 Tim 4:1, 2 Tim 3:1-5).
God, therefore, in his wrath, sends terrible judgments upon the earth and upon men. And these judgments will intensify, Rev 8-9, 16.
The resurrection of man
A small lonely grain is buried in the soil, but it comes up transformed and fruitful. It is a miracle of life. From the Creator comes the force that makes the grain grow, sprout and bear fruit.
The Almighty who created not only the little grains but the whole universe is of course also powerful to one day call the whole human race to stand before him.
Yes, all men from all times will God command to arise on the last day. And those who have died in faith will regain their body, but a transformed and different body, see 1 Cor 15:35-58.
Jesus is the first to be raised from the dead, never to die again. This, too, is a guarantee for us believers, and this is our hope and comfort: He has risen – we shall rise.
By His power God raised the Lord from the dead, and He will raise us also. 1 Cor 6:14.
The judgment
The coming of Jesus, the resurrection of man and the day of judgment are closely linked in the Bible. The first time Jesus came, it was for the salvation of the world. The second time it will be to judge the world. Everyone who has lived on earth will stand individually before the Lord of the universe.
Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight; everything is uncovered and exposed before the eyes of Him to whom we must give account. Hebr 4:13.
On this day, full justice will finally be done. All the unjust judgments and all the evil that has been done in all the days of human history will receive their just treatment on the day of judgment.
All the deeds of darkness here on earth will not have the last word. People who have committed evil deeds, open or hidden, must now come before the Judge and receive their punishment. All sinners will now suffer the judgment of wrath. No one escapes the day of judgment.
Jesus could say this about that day:
For the hour is coming when all who are in their graves will hear His voice and come out—those who have done good to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgment. John 5:28-29
The knowledge that perfect justice is drawing ever closer brings joy and comfort to us believers while we are still alive on earth.
The Bible’s message of judgment also reminds those of us alive today that with life comes responsibility. Everything we have said and done will come before the face of the Judge. We will be held accountable for how we have managed the gift of life and how we have lived towards our neighbor.
On the day of judgment, the main thing that will come to light is how we have responded to the salvation that God has given humanity through his Son. Have we received the Savior and his word? Jesus cried out to the people on one occasion:
There is a judge for the one who rejects Me and does not receive My words: The word that I have spoken will judge him on the last day. John 12:48.
Only through faith in Christ can we be free. This will be the decisive factor. The moment a person repents and believes, he is eternally acquitted. The judgment therefore does not imply any threat of condemnation for those who are in Christ by faith:
There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Rom 8:1.
The final judgment is powerfully portrayed in this text:
Then I saw a great white throne and the One seated on it. Earth and heaven fled from His presence, and no place was found for them. And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne. And there were open books, and one of them was the Book of Life. And the dead were judged according to their deeds, as recorded in the books. The sea gave up its dead, and Death and Hades gave up their dead, and each one was judged according to his deeds. Rev 20:11-13
Eternity
Death, then, is not an end, but a gate. And this gate to the world of infinity will one day open for each of us.
Pause and try to meditate on this reality: eternal life.
We don’t get very far with the thought. The thought becomes dizzying when we realize that the moment a human being comes into being, the flame of eternity is lit, and it will not go out with death but will burn forever.
So precious is man in God’s eyes that he created him for an eternal existence. In the light of this, the wisest thing a person can do during his short time on earth is to prepare for the inevitable, the continuation of life after death.
Where will I spend eternity after my death? There is wisdom in such a question, because not everyone will end up in the same place after death and judgment. According to Jesus, there are two roads with two destinations:
Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the way that leads to life, and only a few find it. Matt 7:13-14.
Hell and the lake of fire
Hell and the lake of fire are an unimaginable reality. To almost everyone in our time, the Bible’s teaching about hell seems enormously repulsive, unloving, and the worst superstition the human mind has invented. That non-believers can see it that way is natural.
Unfortunately, many churches have also abandoned the classical Christian faith, and deny or minimize or explain away hell. Instead, many preach something like this: ”God loves everyone! Therefore, do not be worried. All is well. Everyone will go to heaven.”
But from the Bible’s point of view, such a preaching is demonic and unloving.
The person who has spoken about hell more than anyone else in the Bible is Jesus. The reason, of course, is that Jesus is Love, and true love always warns its neighbor if he is in danger. Jesus, who came from the realm of eternity, had more knowledge of the horrors of hell than anyone else.
Even the writers of the New Testament, who recorded God’s word, knew what it was all about. Whoever therefore listens to them and takes warning is wise. The biblical texts are there in all their nakedness, the siren sounds and the lights flash angrily with a warning glow. Let’s look at some texts. The first two quotes are from Jesus:
Then He will say to those on His left, ‘Depart from Me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.’ Matt 25:41
I tell you, My friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body and after that can do no more. But I will show you whom you should fear: Fear the One who, after you have been killed, has authority to throw you into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear Him! Luke 12:4-5
And the devil … was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur, into which the beast and the false prophet had already been thrown. There they will be tormented day and night forever and ever … And if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire. Rev 20:10, 15
Primarily, God has prepared the lake of fire for the devil and his fallen angels. But this place is also meant for unconverted people who do not believe in the Savior Jesus Christ and who thus live with all their sins unforgiven.
Those who in faith affirm the totality of the Bible’s teaching realize that hell is a holy and righteous decree of God.
Hell also fills us with gratitude and security, because hell means that there is a final place to which all evil is banished, never again to harm God’s chosen people.
The heaven
Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying: “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man, and He will dwell with them. They will be His people, and God Himself will be with them as their God. ‘He will wipe away every tear from their eyes,’ and there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the former things have passed away.” Rev 21:1-4.
In this mighty way John talks about heaven in the last book of the Bible. The Book of Revelation is a mysterious and dramatic book. It is dressed in rich symbolic garment and is therefore difficult to interpret. But it is certainly attractive and beautifully written about heaven.
It is probably the case that what God has prepared for his people is so beautiful that human vocabulary is not enough. It must instead be expressed in an almost unearthly language.
Almost every letter in the New Testament says something about heaven. Of course, Jesus spoke of this too. He spoke of all the rooms in his Father’s house, of going away to make room for all his own, of the glory that was for his disciples, of the great reward in heaven, of the importance of gathering treasure in heaven, and so on.
We believers are on a journey to another world. The beginning of this journey was called repentance and faith. And on the journey we remain in Christ, and as long as we walk the path of salvation, the Bible calls us “foreigners and exiles” here on earth (Hebr 11:13, 1 Peter 2:11).
This world does not have what our heart most deeply desires. Since sin and the Evil One has polluted everything in the world and the thunderclouds of God’s wrath are constantly passing over the earth, it is natural that we often experience everything in the world as depressing emptiness and vanity.
But we keep our courage up because we know that we are on our way to eternal rest in the homeland, to the land where God’s love flows and always will flow.
Those who live with the conviction that heaven awaits will find it easier to live. The problems and burdens of life can then be met with a tone of hope in the heart. We know that at home in heaven there is no evil, no impurity, no temptation, no perverse desires, no trials, no struggles with enemies, no hatred, no anxiety, no pain, no sickness. No suffering of any kind.
There is only joy and peace, together with God, the angels and all God’s people. There we will joyfully serve God and praise Him without anything to burden or hinder us. There we will finally be able to love God and each other – perfectly.
For our light and momentary affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory that is far beyond comparison. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal. Now we know that if the earthly tent we live in is dismantled, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands. 2 Cor 4:17-5:1.
There is much about the afterlife that is incomprehensible and mysterious. The Bible reveals far from all of this reality. In his word, God has only slightly drawn aside the curtain to the world of heaven. It will all be far greater and more glorious than we can ever imagine or think.
But our certainty of heaven and our longing for it must not mean that we escape the reality here on earth. As long as we are here, we have our tasks that we are called to enter into. Everywhere we are to work to sow the gospel of atonement, and grains of goodness, truth and justice. Those who don’t, are running away from the divine mission we have been given to be salt and light (Matt 5:13-16) in the world.
Do you believe this?
At the end of history, Jesus Christ will have the last word. Therefore, his words will be the last here too.
These are the words he spoke to a woman in sorrow, words that ended with a pressing but life-changing question. And to you who read this, Jesus now speaks to you too with these words:
I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in Me will live, even though he dies. And everyone who lives and believes in Me will never die. Do you believe this? John 11:25-26.
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Bible quotations: Berean Standard Bible
You can get a free Bible in your own language for your phone or tablet, or read it online, here: bible.com
Copyright: © Ragnar Blomfelt, 2024
The author of ”The Timeless Message of the Bible” has studied theology and has pastoral education. He has also worked for many years in Bible translation.