FIRST MONAGHAN
presbyterian church
Why do we need to be reconciled to God?
We need to be reconciled to God because our first human parents, Adam and Eve, broke the trusting relationship they had with God and listened to His enemy the Devil. So, they turned their back on God, and now every human-being since suffers the consequences of inheriting their wrong-doing, sinful nature. This has caused us so much pain through hurting one another and from living in a world we have broken and continue to damage. But most of all it has set us in a place where we are God’s enemies and justifiably subject to the punishment of eternal separation and destruction. Eternity for those who continue to be unreconciled to God, begins after death, in the place of separation called Hell in English.
Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned
Romans 5: 12
The wicked shall be turned into hell,
And all the nations who forget God.
Psalm 9: 7
And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment.
Hebrews 9: 27
How can we be reconciled with God?
God’s love is wonderful and His grace is amazing! Even though no one deserves such peace and mercy from God, He decreed from eternity past to save people from this terrible situation. For, before time began, God knew every one of us who would exist and planned to take upon Himself, in the person of His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, the penalty for all our wrong-doing, our sin.
Jesus teaches us that we are saved from God’s holy and justifiable wrath when we place our trust in who He is as our Saviour, in what He has done in freely dying for us by crucifixion, conquering death by His own power in rising from the dead, and ascending into heaven. When we begin to trust in Christ’s work, through God’s gracious gift of faith, we are adopted as His children and enjoy all the benefits bestowed by Christ’s work of reconciliation.
God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Romans 5: 8
Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him. John 3: 36
Our reconciliation with God was fulfilled in an eternal covenant by the blood of Jesus on the cross and is sealed, or guaranteed, by the indwelling presence of God the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit helps us, giving us the strength to live to honour God by obedience to His commands as we love Him with all our heart, soul, mind and strength; and to love our neighbours as ourselves.
In all this we can live through the mess of our lives in this world with confidence that, because of Jesus, and the life we live in Him, we will go to be with Him in heaven on our deaths. And, we will be raised to dwell with God, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit in the new heavens and the new earth at the end of this age.
But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. Ephesians 2: 13
For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father. So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God. Ephesians 2: 18-19
Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the Father loves whoever has been born of him. By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments.
1 John 5: 1-2