Since the fall of Adam and Eve and their expulsion from the "perfect" Garden of Eden, God has been tirelessly proclaiming His salvation plan.
Adam and Eve, who disobediently ate from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, was also free to eat from the Tree of Life and live like "God" forever. God therefore had to remove them from the Garden and stationed cherubim to guard the Tree of Life. This same Tree's leaves will be for the healing of the nations (all people groups from all the nations of the world) which is in the Holy City as described in Revelation Chapter 22.
The whole Salvation Plan is centered around the Seed which will be Spirit conceived in a virgin's womb. This Seed, Jesus Christ, born to a virgin Mary will become our Kinsman Redeemer. Curse, pain, death came into the picture after the fall of mankind and everything that was "perfect", started to deteriorate. This state, as we read about in our newspapers, will continue until God's Salvation Plan is completely fulfilled at the End.
But after so long, the End is not yet and it seems like nothing is happening! This is when we need to know God's nature which Peter captures in his second letter in chapter 3. We read Peter's account about God's timing............ "God isn't late with his promise as some measure lateness. He is restraining himself on account of you, holding back the End because he doesn't want anyone lost. He's giving everyone space and time to change."
The word there is "everyone", (wow) what a God!
Imagine this, we cannot in our own mind "see" the person we "hate" become our friend again because of what the person did to us. And yet God wants this person in heaven and what more, we are all going to be worshiping Him, as a family. That is, if we ourselves, do manage to get in....don't see how, with this"hate" in us. Paul talks about this very thing in Galatians 5:19-21 (Msg) It is obvious what kind of life develops out of trying to get your own way all the time: repetitive, loveless, cheap sex; a stinking accumulation of mental and emotional garbage; frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness; trinket gods; magic-show religion; paranoid loneliness; cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants; a brutal temper; an impotence to love or be loved; divided homes and divided lives; small-minded and lopsided pursuits; the vicious habit of depersonalizing everyone into a rival; uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions; ugly parodies of community. I could go on. This isn't the first time I have warned you, you know. If you use your freedom this way, you will not inherit God's kingdom.
God does not change and we can be completely confident about this. So do I know where I am going to spend eternity? If the answer is "no", let me encourage us in childlike faith to prayer to God our Father and believe that He will accept our prayer and thus become certain that we will be saved, with Him in heaven, as one big happy family!
Please pray this prayer to receive God's salvation:
Father, I confess that I am a sinner; please forgive me of my sin. I accept Your forgiveness. I believe that Jesus Christ died and was raised from the dead so that I can now have eternal life through faith in Him. Come into my life, Jesus, and be my Savior and Lord. Thank You for saving me. Amen
Adam and Eve, who disobediently ate from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, was also free to eat from the Tree of Life and live like "God" forever. God therefore had to remove them from the Garden and stationed cherubim to guard the Tree of Life. This same Tree's leaves will be for the healing of the nations (all people groups from all the nations of the world) which is in the Holy City as described in Revelation Chapter 22.
The whole Salvation Plan is centered around the Seed which will be Spirit conceived in a virgin's womb. This Seed, Jesus Christ, born to a virgin Mary will become our Kinsman Redeemer. Curse, pain, death came into the picture after the fall of mankind and everything that was "perfect", started to deteriorate. This state, as we read about in our newspapers, will continue until God's Salvation Plan is completely fulfilled at the End.
But after so long, the End is not yet and it seems like nothing is happening! This is when we need to know God's nature which Peter captures in his second letter in chapter 3. We read Peter's account about God's timing............ "God isn't late with his promise as some measure lateness. He is restraining himself on account of you, holding back the End because he doesn't want anyone lost. He's giving everyone space and time to change."
The word there is "everyone", (wow) what a God!
Imagine this, we cannot in our own mind "see" the person we "hate" become our friend again because of what the person did to us. And yet God wants this person in heaven and what more, we are all going to be worshiping Him, as a family. That is, if we ourselves, do manage to get in....don't see how, with this"hate" in us. Paul talks about this very thing in Galatians 5:19-21 (Msg) It is obvious what kind of life develops out of trying to get your own way all the time: repetitive, loveless, cheap sex; a stinking accumulation of mental and emotional garbage; frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness; trinket gods; magic-show religion; paranoid loneliness; cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants; a brutal temper; an impotence to love or be loved; divided homes and divided lives; small-minded and lopsided pursuits; the vicious habit of depersonalizing everyone into a rival; uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions; ugly parodies of community. I could go on. This isn't the first time I have warned you, you know. If you use your freedom this way, you will not inherit God's kingdom.
God does not change and we can be completely confident about this. So do I know where I am going to spend eternity? If the answer is "no", let me encourage us in childlike faith to prayer to God our Father and believe that He will accept our prayer and thus become certain that we will be saved, with Him in heaven, as one big happy family!
Please pray this prayer to receive God's salvation:
Father, I confess that I am a sinner; please forgive me of my sin. I accept Your forgiveness. I believe that Jesus Christ died and was raised from the dead so that I can now have eternal life through faith in Him. Come into my life, Jesus, and be my Savior and Lord. Thank You for saving me. Amen
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