Why This Started
I checked my mail one day at my apartment, within this mail was a little card asking me to seek answers to spiritual questions. You may have seen something like this before. "Are you right with God?", "Are you going to heaven?". Good, solid questions. I was intrigued, as a Christian myself I love seeing these tracts and get excited to check out what people are doing in the community.
So I followed a link to the site that was provided. I was immediately frustrated. "Where is the gospel?" I thought to myself as I scrolled through the page. I began to pay more attention to my daily interactions from that point forward. What were people trusting for salvation? I started to ask them. The responses shocked me.
- "I was born a Christian"
- "No one can know if they are saved."
- "God chose me to be a Christian."
- "I was water baptized."
- "I asked Jesus into my heart."
- "I am a member of the church."
- "I had a dream."
The Bible says there is only one thing that can save your soul.
##The Clear Gospel The gospel is the most important information that anyone alive today can learn.
The word "gospel" simply means "good news". When we're talking about the Bible, learning good news is made even more important because it's good news from God himself - and your salvation depends on it. What good news? To understand the good news that we're looking for we need to first understand the bad news.
The bad news is that the whole of humanity is born separated from God because of sin. Man was once perfect in body, soul, and spirit, able to live in complete righteousness walking with God. The first man and woman fell from their position with God by disobedience, and were separated from him. Death entered into the world. Creation was broken, and humanity hopelessly lost. Thus our problem, we are all born unrighteous and will be judged by a righteous God. How can we ever hope to be found righteous?
The answer to this is that Jesus Christ, the son of God, both God and man came to this Earth to die for us. A perfect sacrifice, a man without sin, without spot, without blemish, and fully connected with God (because he is God). He did not deserve death, but gave himself for us so that he could offer humanity salvation and mercy. Three days after being slain on a cross, Jesus rose from the dead, defeating sin and death. By this work, it is possible that sins could be forgiven and sinners counted as righteous. This is commonly called, "The Crosswork of Christ", or the "Death, Burial, and Resurrection" (DBR).
We access the power of this crosswork when we believe that Jesus did these things as a payment for our sins. We must understand that we can in no way contribute to our salvation. The only thing that saves us is believing God and what he did for us, based on that we are counted righteous. This is all by the grace of God. That is good news!
But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness. - Romans 4:5
Now What?
To be saved, a person must believe that Christ died and rose again 3 days later as a payment for his or her sins. It's that simple, it's that clear. That's the gospel that the Bible asks us to believe for our salvation today.
What happens after that? Can you lose salvation? No. Should you do good works? Yes, with the proper heart motivation. It's these types of questions that this site aims to answer moving forward. If you're looking for guidance on where to start reading your Bible I would recommend starting with Romans 3-8 to get a basic understanding of how salvation impacted you in ways you may not even realize!
Grace and Peace