Wow! My heart feels like it’s about to explode from all of the love in it. I don’t know what’s going on in my spirit (or maybe it’s just the caffeine from my coffee kicking in) but I just feel like I need to tell somebody about the love of Jesus! The word “gospel” means “good news,” and I feel like it’s really the best news anybody will ever hear. So here’s the gospel. Feel free to share this amazing testimony of the only love that will satisfy our hearts!

Yahweh, the God of Abraham, Isaac, Israel, and David, made all of creation. He made you and me and the trees and the sky and space and rain and everything in between.

He made us for the sake of dwelling with us in relationship because He loves us. 

That’s the purpose behind the Garden of Eden – so He could live and co-labor with Adam and Eve. He loves us so much that He wants to live in communion with us – closer than any friend we’ve ever known!

However, in the garden mankind chose their own desires over the wisdom of God. He told His precious creation they could delight in all of the garden except one thing: the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Adam and Eve disobeyed God and ate from that tree anyway. If you’re wondering why one act of disobedience was such a big deal, understand that choosing to act against God’s command meant Adam and Eve thought they knew better than God. Creation exalted itself over the Creator. They put their judgments and desires above God’s sovereign knowledge, and thus they chose sin. (Sin simply means doing something that goes against God.)

God is holy, which means set apart. He is pure and righteous, and by definition He cannot be in the presence of sin. Think of God as light and sin as darkness – both cannot inhabit the same space.

Adam and Eve were now essentially clothed in sin, so God couldn’t be in their midst like He was when they were pure and blameless. This broke God’s heart because His whole goal was to live among His children.

From that point, as we find in God’s Word, God orchestrated and worked intricate plans to reunite Himself with His children, to once again bless them with His presence. Time and time again, man consistently chose their own desires over a relationship with God. But God insisted! He kept gifting His children His presence. He showed up faithfully as a pillar of fire, a pillar of cloud, a burning bush, in the ark of the covenant, and in the Holy of Holies in His tabernacle.

Although His presence was available, man was still covered in sin, so to enter His holy presence there had to be a sacrifice. Under the old covenant, the bloodshed that was pure enough to substitute for man’s sin came from a clean animal. God also gave specific instructions for His people to follow, basically as guidelines for how to live pure lives in order that they could enter His presence and be in relationship with Him again, which was His ultimate goal always. 

However, God’s children steadily turned toward their own desires and sinned again and again. The whole Old Testament tells of God’s pursuit of the hearts of His children who insist on turning away from Him.

It’s so ironic because God promises life and blessing and fullness if His people humble themselves and seek Him, but He says apart from Him they will find pain and turmoil and dissatisfaction. Why is it like this? Why are those our two options – God/life or sin/death?

Because we were made by God and for God (Colossians 1:16). We were made to worship and love God, and that’s why nothing else in the world satisfies us like God does.

In Deuteronomy 30, God gives His children the choice that each one of us has to face: serve God (love Him) and receive the blessings/life that accompany that, or choose to pursue our own desires and be the god of our own lives and receive the curses/death that result.

Throughout scripture there is a recurring theme:

• The people who say, “Yes, Yahweh, You made me and love me, so I will love and serve You like You deserve, my Creator and my King!” live full lives, walking in relationship with God.
• The people who say, “It’s my life so I will do what I want when I want just to please myself,” usually are plagued by hopelessness and pain and emptiness.

God patiently allowed mankind to use their free will, waiting to see who of His children would respond to His gift of life by giving Him the love He is worthy of. Eventually His children reached the point where they realized that their sin was too great for them to bear, and that they need a Savior, a King, a Redeemer to reconcile them. (To reconcile them means to simply bring them back into relationship with Him.)

In His infinite love, God became flesh in the person of Jesus Christ. He lived a completely sinless life, and then was crucified. Because He was pure, His death was the final sacrifice for our sin.

He didn’t just die, though. Three days after His death, He resurrected Himself! He literally conquered death.

Because His sacrifice was perfect, He established a new covenant between God and His children: no more animal sacrifices were needed, no more rituals or rules had to be observed to get into God’s presence. Because of Jesus, all you have to do is believe in who He was and what He did.

So now we have the opportunity to get to know Jesus in an intimate way. When you choose to believe in Him, you begin a relationship with Him. It’s like any other relationship you have with a person – only 100 times better. We can spend time with Him by talking to Him (prayer), listening to Him (He talks back), and reading about Him (the Bible is all about His passionate love for us).

When you accept His love for you, it changes your life. Getting to know Him and His love for you brings abundant life, like He promises in John 10:10. What does this abundant life look like? It’s loving with a generous heart. Clinging to joy regardless of what life throws at you. Having a peace and contentment in all circumstances. Who wouldn’t want that? Jesus gives us the opportunity to trade hatred and bitterness for love and compassion, depression and mourning for joy and rejoicing, hopelessness and abdandonment for an unwavering hope and adoption into His family as a son or daughter. On paper it just seems like the easiest choice!

However, life with Jesus isn’t easy. He promises His followers trials and tribulations. Hardships come to test us to see if our love for Him is genuine. But, oh, is He worthy! Persecution with Jesus is a million times better than an easy life without Him. Why? Because Jesus’s good and faithful servants get to spend eternity in relationship with Him. When Christians die, they are reunited with Jesus and will be with Him in His love forever.

However, those who decided on earth that He wasn’t worthy of their lives spend eternity away from Him. We only get one chance to choose Him, and our decision determines how we spend life after death – permanently.

So today, regardless of where you are, I want you to know that there is Someone who loves you so much that He literally died and then brought Himself back to life so you could have a relationship with Him. He will satisfy all your needs. Jesus’s love has been, is, and always will be faithful to those who choose to seek Him with all their hearts. 

“…Choose this day whom you will serve… But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”‭‭ -Joshua‬ ‭24:15‬