Hi! Welcome to my Most Important Thing in the World blog site.
By way of a brief introduction, My name is John, I call myself ‘JB’ on the web, and I live in Hamilton, New Zealand. I am married and have three adult children, all gainfully employed and busy with their lives. I have lived in various parts of the world, and hold both New Zealand and Irish citizenship. I have had a web presence, in one form or another, since pretty much the inception of the web. You are welcome to visit my other sites via my web portal at: www.jbc.gen.nz.
On this site I plan to post articles and items of help and interest concerning, The Most Important Thing in the World, how to be sure of eternal life. I describe myself as a Bible believing follower of Jesus Christ. That is to say, a Christian. For the sake of clarification, when I use the term Christian, for my part I mean things that relate to Jesus Christ. Further, I am non-sectarian and trans-denominational. The basics of my personal faith are simple; they are:
I believe in the Godhead. I understand this to be God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. I don’t particularly like the word, ‘trinity’ simply because it is not found in the Bible. Nevertheless, I am happy to be viewed as what is traditionally seen as ‘trinitarian’. Always provided that by that I am understood to believe in the mystery of the Godhead being composed of three distinct beings who are co-equal and all share the commonly held characteristics of omniscience, omnipotence and omnipresence. A further qualification I would like to add is that I am hesitant in discussing the Godhead as I feel uncomfortable giving the impression that as a human being of necessarily limited understanding I can be in any way definitive about the God who created me. “Know that the Lord is God. It is he who made us, and we are his; we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.” Psalm 100:3 NIV
I believe in the Bible as the Word of God. Put very simply, by the Bible I mean the collection of books comprising the Old Testament and the New Testament from the book of Genesis to the last book in the most usually accepted collection of books that end with the Book of Revelation. Also, this collection of books, or library of books, which is what ‘biblos‘ or Bible means may be read from any of the main stream translations, and read as one would read any other piece of written work. When read like this the collective message of the Bible gives a clear and straightforward explanation of the plan, purpose and mind of God in relation to mankind. There may be much the Bible does not address, or if it does, refers to only in passing, but what it does address in detail and with much clarity, is clear and unambiguous. We can say as the Old Testament writer wrote, “Whoever walks the [this] road, although a fool, Shall not go astray.” Isaiah 35:8 NKJV The road mentioned here is simply an Old Testament reference to the ‘way’ or the path provided in the Bible. So often, it’s not what we don’t understand that is the issue, rather it’s pretty much always what we can clearly understand and see, that is the challenge for human beings. So, in that sense I believe and accept the Bible to be the Word of God, God’s message in written form for humanity. The essential truths are clear and simple. You don’t need to be a rocket scientist. Here it is: The Bible is concerned with right and wrong. Good and bad. Evil and righteousness. Essentially, we are told what is wrong or sinful, and what is right or good. What is wrong and bad is against the will of God. What is good and right is according to His will. The bad earns wages, which the Bible clearly reveals to be death. Death in the Bible is always separation from God. Ultimately, the bad, or sin, earns eternal wages. These ‘wages’ are eternal separation from God and all that is good for ever and ever in the lake of Fire, called in the Greek, Gehenna. Why should that be so? The Bible makes it very clear. God is good. Goodness and sin cannot continue to coexist. They may
The Cross of Christ
seem to manage to do so, but eventually, for God to be consistent, he must judge or deal with sin. Yet, God is also love. This creates a huge tension. This tension was resolved when Love and Justice met at the Cross. At the Cross God made a way for the demands of justice to be met and the demands of love to be met. The due and just punishment for sin fell on Christ. Christ who, as the second member of the Godhead, took upon Himself the punishment for our sin. He, Jesus Christ, was punished for us. Hence, a way was made for you and I to go free. In spite of the fact that we are and were the sinners, we are invited to accept the vicarious punishment that He took for our sin and go free. In the words of perhaps the most well known verse in the Bible, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.“ John 3:16.
Now, it has to be said that, the inevitable and logical consequence of failing to accept His provision of salvation leads to the justice of the seventeenth verse, not the most well known verse in the Bible, but a very important one, nevertheless, “…he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.” John 3:17
The Old Testament has a wonderful invitation that I extend to you, dear reader, now as you read this, “Kiss the Son, lest He be angry with you and you perish in the way.” Psalm 2:12 Don’t rail against the fearsome and awesome justice of the God of the Universe. Do the wise, sensible thing and follow these five simple steps you need to take right now to be sure of eternal life, The Most Important Thing in the World.
- Admit you are a sinner -you have sinned (broken His law and fallen short of His standard of right and wrong).
- Ask Him now to forgive you for your sins and be willing to turn away from living your life according to your own standards of right and wrong and accept His standards depending upon Him to help you to do what is right in His sight from now on.
- Trust Him to forgive you and accept you as a brand new child of God and rely on Him from now on to help you to live for Him from now on.
- Develop His friendship by consciously cultivating His fellowship and friendship every day of your life for the rest of your life. This means learning to talk to Him (we call this praying).
- Practice being good according to the standards and teachings of His Word the Bible. Read the Bible and treat it as His personal message to you seeking to understand it and apply it to every aspect of your life.
If you do these five simple things you will receive the gift of eternal life and that means you will have started living an everlasting life which will go on forever, unhindered by physical death. “And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.“ John 17:3
I have posted and will continue to post articles and items I trust will be helpful to you as you progress in your new life in Christ. If you care to email me and let me know you have made this decision I would be thrilled to hear from you and will pray for you that the Lord will bless you and keep you and guide you on this exciting journey that you have begun.
If you are still thinking about it all, then I urge you to pray and ask the Lord Jesus to make Himself known to you. He is well able to guide you into a place of trust and faith in Him. The Holy Spirit has a wonderful way of speaking to us within our inner selves. A sort of intuitive understanding that deepens into a solid faith.
Yours faithfully,
John
