1) God created man and woman in his image, with a pure heart, clear conscience and free will, to live in harmony and enjoy sonship and fellowship with Him eternally.
But because they once disobeyed God, sin entered their hearts, and they lost the privilege of being immortal and of having sonship and communion with God.
2) As a result of the transgression of the first man and woman, we have all inherited their sinful nature of thinking negative thoughts, speaking negative words, and doing negative actions.
The power of sin is ruling our minds and hearts to the point that we do things we don't want to do, and we don't do things we want to do.
However, God didn't completely abandon us, as He sent prophets and gave us his commandments, the moral code to show us what sin is. But man could not follow the commandments by his own strength to have a pure heart and a clear conscience.
Jesus came from Heaven and became human like the first man before he sinned. In fact, he was the only man who was born of a woman and of God's Spirit. That’s why he was sinless and could redeem us from our sinful nature and eternal perdition.
At the age of thirty, Jesus was baptized in water as a sign of his commitment to reveal his divine glory and to be persecuted and killed for openly confessing who he was. And right after, he received the fullness of God's own Holy Spirit, which descended from Heaven to anoint him and empower him to fulfill his mission on earth.
Jesus proclaimed God's truth, healed the sick, and freed those oppressed by the devil. He continually showed his love and grace to all, until out of envy one day he was arrested, falsely accused and mistreated by the Jewish religious leaders. They then handed him over to be executed by the Romans, at the end of his ministry three and a half years later.
Jesus was cruelly beaten and whipped, then crucified, mocked, and cursed on a cross. And after some long hours of pain and agony, he died without mercy, rejected by all and even without the Spirit of his Father.
Jesus shed his blood as a sin offering for our sins, as the perfect Lamb of God. His sacrifice was able to pay the debt we owed to God. Through his bloodshed and death, he was able to remove the curse of sin's power over us and forgive all our sins, so that we could be made righteous before God, his Father.
But because Jesus was sinless, God raised him from the dead on the third day. He ascended into heaven at the right hand of God and sent us his Holy Spirit so that Jesus can live in our hearts and work through us.
4) How can we be saved from the power of sin and be reconciled to God?
• We must believe that God sent Jesus to save us from the power of sin through his death and resurrection.
• We must repent wholeheartedly of our sins and turn to God so that He may remove our hardened hearts and give us a tender one.
• We must be baptized in water in the name of Jesus to bury our old sinful nature and rise with him, so that our sins may be washed away and we may have a new life, and so that Jesus, who gave his life for us, may become our personal Lord and Savior.
• We must receive the gift of God's Holy Spirit (God's spiritual presence) within us. By receiving this gift, we become a new creation—adopted children of God with a divine nature.
At that moment, God will help us do good because sin no longer has dominion over us. We have a new nature, the glorious nature of God, and we want to do what pleases Him.
5) What is God's will for us, his adopted and born again children?
• God wants us to have a daily personal communion with Him and with Jesus, by praying in their Holy Spirit and meditating on their Holy Word, in order to receive more of their selfless love and to become one in mind and spirit with them.
▪︎ God wants us to love all humanity with his selfless love, and especially those of the family of faith in Jesus.
• God wants us to proclaim boldly and faithfully the Good News of God's salvation (from the power of sin and eternal perdition) and reconciliation to Him, by his marvellous grace and through faith in Jesus' sacrifice and resurrection.
• God wants us to bless and heal those who need physical and/or spiritual healing, laying on hands and commanding healing to come in the name of Jesus and the power of God.
▪︎ God wants us to build one another up, equip new believers in the faith, and work together to advance God's Kingdom by bringing Jesus to many.
6) Jesus lived a holy life on Earth, constantly thanking and praying to God in the Spirit, and loving everyone. And also he lived in obedience to God, speaking his words of truth and showing his miraculous healing power, and dying for all humanity.
If we follow Jesus' teachings, we will also live holy and obedient lives. And consequently, we will love God and anyone around, and fulfill Jesus' command to spread God's Good News everywhere and at every opportunity, so that many may enter his marvellous heavenly Kingdom.
God loved us so much that He sent his only Son Jesus to give his whole life for our sake, so that we might live eternally. Are you willing to give Jesus your whole life, to follow him and obey his commandments to love God intimately and those around you as you love yourself?
