Lesson 105 – Mankind’s Problem with God: Resolved
From birth, every human, sins deliberately against God, breaking His commands continually. Left in this condition, our fate would be eternal separation from God. Which is hell. There are no acts of goodness and no amount of punishment that would make us right with God. If we are punished for our wrong doing, we only get what we deserve. Moreover, our sin is against a God that is eternally righteous and pure, and our punishment would need to be eternal for justice to be served. Nothing short of this would satisfy God’s requirement for justice, and no amount of punishment would change our sinful nature.
But in His mercy, God did not abandon us to this condition. To accomplish our salvation required a sacrifice of one who Himself was eternally righteous and pure, Jesus Christ, Himself God. In an exchange that is difficult to understand, God allows our sinfulness to be commuted to Jesus and His righteousness to us. By our faith in Him as our Savior, we are baptized into His death and buried with Him in baptism. Our soul, once corrupt and grotesque is made pure through this union. Through faith in Jesus we become positionally dead to our sins, and can then be free to give ourselves over to a life of righteous service to God. We emerge from this burial with Christ as new creatures. Jesus paid the price God required for justice to be served.
And so, Jesus’ physical body died because of sin, our sin, just as every human must die because of sin. Jesus also suffered the second death, separation from God. But because He was sinless, the separation from God was only temporary. His physical death and temporary separation were enough to satisfy God’s requirement for justice, and Jesus was raised to new life. Our union with Jesus and the presence of the Holy Spirit in us, ensure that although our bodies will die because of our sin, we will not be separated from God even temporarily, because Jesus already paid the price.
It’s up to us now, each day, in all good conscience, to ensure that in the day’s activities we put forth every effort into making all that baptism symbolizes a reality. We need to confess our sins each day, pray for God’s strength to turn from them, and repent when we fail. We can then have confidence in, delight in and trust in, the love of God in Jesus Christ. Nothing can separate us from the love of God, even death. And though we will leave the world we know with trepidation over going to the unknown, we can trust in the promises of God in bringing us to a far better place.