| PART ONE
INTRODUCTION
The Most Important Decision You Will Ever Make
Do you sometimes wish you could start over? Or do you lead a successful life from all outward appearances but often wonder, Surely there must be more to life than this? In either case, there is good news for you. God wants to make your life new. He wants to give you a brand- new start if you need one.
Some people have tried religion hoping to find a solution to their frustrating existence. The people who find “religion” to be a burden of lifeless and unreasonable rules they are unable to keep have not found God. If you are one of those people, God has a new life to give you through His Son Jesus Christ. Jesus did not die to offer us religion, rather he died to give us an opportunity to have an intimate relationship with God through faith in Him.
If you need to feel loved, if you need your sins forgiven, if you need a friend who will help you with everything you do, if you need a great future, Jesus Christ is your answer. He is waiting to make you into a brand- new creation and give you a new life beyond the best you could possibly imagine.
If you are not satisfied with your life, then you must change something. Like anyone else, if you keep doing the same things you have always done, you will have the life you have always had. You need to make a decision, the most important decision you will ever make. This decision is more important than your career choice, where you will attend college, whom you will marry, how you will invest your money, or where you will live. This decision concerns eternity.
Eternity is time without end, and there is life after death. When we die, we don’t cease to exist; we just begin to exist in another place. It has been said that dying is like going through a revolving door. We simply leave one place and go to another. We— every one of us— need to know where we will spend eternity.
The decision to receive Jesus is a new birth into a relationship with God for eternity beginning here on earth. When you receive Jesus as your Savior, your spirit is made alive to God. The Bible tells us if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature— re- created, born anew. Old things have passed away and all things are brand- new (see 2 Corinthians 5:17). Jesus takes our sin, and we are made right with God (see 2 Corinthians 5:21). God imputes righteousness to us or credits it to our account (see Romans 4:11).
The new birth happens in an instant. The burden of sin is lifted and we have a brand- new opportunity in our lives. Learning to live the new life is a process, but not one of trying to conform our behavior to a set of rules of what we think a Christian should be. Many Christians without an understanding of the new life God makes available to them through Jesus spend their lives trying to earn their own righteousness through doing good works. This doesn’t work because God has already made them acceptable to Him at new birth through Jesus. Righteousness is a free gift from God to be received through faith. Trying to earn a free gift is like trying to get into a chair in which you are already sitting. It is impossible and very frustrating!
The new life is a process of transformation. God doesn’t work just with our behavior; He also changes our hearts. When we seriously commit ourselves to Jesus as Savior and Lord, God begins transforming us from the inside out. He makes us like Jesus inside and wants to work what is in us out for other people to see and experience Jesus.
This transformation doesn’t happen overnight and will seem very slow at times. One of the benefits of living in a relationship with Jesus is the freedom to forget the past and move ahead into what God has for us. Jeremiah 29:11 describes the type of future He has in store for us: “For I know the thoughts and plans that I have for you, says the Lord, thoughts and plans for welfare and peace and not for evil, to give you hope in your final outcome.”
When you are tempted to condemn yourself over the progress you think you should be making, turn your focus back on Jesus and God’s promises for us recorded in the Bible. Remind yourself, “I’m okay and I’m on my way!” Remember that through faith you have been made right with God, and even though you have not arrived at perfection you are making progress.
Is it hard to make daily the right decisions to allow God to transform you? Yes, like many other things in life, it is hard at times, and we all make mistakes along the way. Is it worth sticking to? Absolutely!
Many people come to Jesus sincerely desiring to start a new life but don’t know what to do after they receive Him. Take this opportunity to begin enjoying the journey God has for you, and start your new life today. You can have a dynamic intimate relationship with God and an amazing life!
CHAPTER 1
Start Your New Life Today
When you receive Jesus as your Savior, a divine exchange takes place. You give Him your sin and guilt, your shame and blame; He gives you right standing with God. You give Him the impoverished areas of your life; He gives you abundance. Jesus wants to give you beauty for ashes in every area of your life.
Sometimes people ask, “What would I have to give up if I became a Christian?”
I tell them, “Well, you would have to give up misery and sin. You would give up depression and discouragement, fear, worry, and anxiety. Do you carry around a burden of guilt and condemnation? You would also give that up.”
Some people seem to think God wants to steal everything we enjoy. God isn’t mean! He is love, and He is good. The Bible says God gives us all things ceaselessly to enjoy (see 1 Timothy 6:17). God loves us so much He sent His Son, Jesus, to earth to take our sins and give us life, life more abundantly (see John 3:16; 10:10).
When we receive Jesus, we receive the kingdom of God within us, and that kingdom is righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit (see Romans 14:17). We can choose to continue living with misery, depression, discouragement, fear, worry, anxiety, guilt, and condemnation, but Jesus wants us to receive freedom from those things.
Through Jesus, “we are more than conquerors and gain a surpassing victory through Him Who loved us” (Romans 8:37).
A new birth into a new life is not supposed to be a door into a downtrodden, miserable existence of struggling to keep religious rules and regulations and feeling guilty when we fail. God gives us a new life and new desires to go along with it. We may lose interest in pursuing some things we used to like very much. A new life as a new creation in relationship with Jesus has brought the fulfillment we used to seek elsewhere. As these changes take place in us, we may not fully understand what we are feeling, but as we trust God He gives us clarity and we begin enjoying our new life in Christ.
The people who wonder what they would have to give up by choosing to receive Jesus are often cycling through repeated behaviors looking for fulfillment they will never find. If you are one of those people, are you tired of living the way you are living? Are you tired of going through life feeling bad about yourself all the time?
Are you tired of making decisions you know are wrong and then feeling guilty about those decisions? Do you want to find the fulfillment you are missing? You may be tired of wondering what will happen to you in the future or tired of being afraid of dying. The good news is Jesus has peace for you.
If you haven’t done a good job of running your own life, why not turn it over to the One who created you and knows more about you than you will ever know about yourself? If you start having trouble with an automobile, you take it back to the people who manufactured it to fix it. A similar principle is true with God. He created you and loves you very much. If your life is not satisfying to you, then take it to Him to fix it.
If you want to have a relationship with God here on earth and live with Him for eternity, you need to receive Jesus Christ as your Savior. We have all sinned and we all need a Savior. God sent His only Son to pay the penalty for our sins. He was crucified and shed His innocent blood as payment for our wrongdoing. He died and was buried, but on the third day He arose from the dead and is now seated in heaven, at the right hand of God the Father. He is your only hope of having peace, joy, and right standing with God.
Your life will not change unless you make that very important decision to receive Jesus as your Savior. The choice to accept new life in God is available to everyone. No one is left out. And no one can make your choice for you. It is yours and yours alone to make. What quality of life do you desire to have? Do you really want to follow the example you see in our society today? God’s Word tells us we came into the world with nothing and we will go out with nothing (see 1 Timothy 6:7). Don’t spend your life on things that will end up in a junkyard somewhere.
Spend it laying up treasure in heaven (see Matthew 6:20). God is the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. In the beginning there was God and in the end there will be God. Every person will stand before Him and give an account of their life (see Romans 14:12). Do you want to use your life to build up treasures in heaven and let God use you in a way that can affect others for eternity?
As you use your life for eternal significance, you will find the fulfilling life on earth you have been seeking. Anything we give to God immediately takes on immortality. If we give Him our time, talents, and possessions, He can use them to do good things here and for eternity. If we give them to the world, they will end up in a junkyard. It might be good for all of us to visit a junkyard once a year to remind ourselves that all temporal things eventually end up there.
CHAPTER 2
Leave Guilt Behind
Sin is deliberate disobedience to the known will of God. We have all sinned. There is no one on the earth who never sins (see Ecclesiastes 7:20). This is the bad news: “All have sinned and are falling short of the honor and glory which God bestows and receives” (Romans 3:23).
There is also good news. We can all be forgiven and made right with God: “[All] are justified and made upright and in right standing with God, freely and gratuitously by His grace (His unmerited favor and mercy) through the redemption which is [provided] in Christ Jesus” (v. 24).
Sin leads to destruction. God’s Word says our sin will find us out (see Numbers 32:23). Sin brings a curse and obedience brings blessing (see Deuteronomy 28). For a season, people may appear to be unaffected by their sin. Their lives may appear to be as good as anyone else’s, but in the end there will always be consequences for choices made. God speaks about the outcome of people attempting to live without Him: “And I will bring distress upon men, so that they shall walk like blind men, because they have sinned against the Lord; their blood shall be poured out like dust and their flesh like dung. Neither their silver nor their gold shall be able to deliver them in the day of the Lord’s indignation and wrath. But the whole earth shall be consumed in the fire of His jealous wrath, for a full, yes, a sudden, end will He make of all the inhabitants of the earth” (Zephaniah 1:17–18).
These scriptures are fearsome, but they need not strike fear in the heart of a sincere believer in Jesus Christ. We who believe in Jesus shall never come up for judgment or condemnation (see John 3:18). God forgives our sins when we admit them, are sorry for them, and are willing to allow Him to help us turn entirely away from them.
“If we [freely] admit that we have sinned and confess our sins, He is faithful and just (true to His own nature and promises) and will forgive our sins [dismiss our lawlessness] and [continuously] cleanse us from all unrighteousness [everything not in conformity to His will in purpose, thought, and action]” (1 John 1:9). As new creations in right standing with God through Jesus, we have been provided the way to ask for and receive forgiveness and turn away from what we did wrong through the power of God’s Spirit working in us.
The people who choose a life of sin rather than a life of obedience to God experience misery in their souls. Man lives in a body made of flesh and bones, but man is actually a spirit and has a soul. The soul is comprised of the mind, will, and emotions. The soul is the personality of man. No matter what people without Jesus do or possess, they cannot find anything to completely satisfy them. Sinners, in choosing to run their own lives instead of giving God control, suffer in their minds. When things don’t go their way, they are in mental anguish and become frustrated or angry knowing nothing of the way of faith. To trust God— a power greater than themselves— is incomprehensible to them. They never allow rest to enter their minds— or their souls. Their lot in life is misery, misery, and more misery!
The constant companion of sinners is guilt. They are unable to escape it. They may try a variety of ways to ignore it, but deep down inside they know their lives are not right. The Bible is divided into two parts representing man’s condition and God’s solution to remove the sin and guilt separating man from Him. The first part, the Old Testament, is just that, the old way, representing the Old Covenant God used to cover the sins of the people until the time came for Jesus to establish a New Covenant. Under the Old Covenant, the people’s sins could be covered through a system of giving sacrifices for their sins. The sins were covered but never removed. The guilt was always present. However, under the New Covenant— the second part of the Bible, the New Testament— Jesus became the perfect and final sacrifice. He didn’t cover the sins but removed and completely washed them away, along with the guilt that accompanies them.
You need not wait for God to do something. He has already done what needs to be done. He gave His only Son to die in our place because only a perfect and sinless sacrifice could be offered to pay for our misdeeds. Justice has been satisfied and we can enjoy a life of freedom through believing in Jesus Christ and entering an intimate relationship with God through Him. We cannot go to God on our own— we need an advocate. We need someone as a go- between, and that someone is Jesus. In order to bring us to God, Jesus stood in the gap between us and God, the gap that our sin had created.
The only way to enter God’s rest is through believing in Him (see Hebrews 4:3). Just as a child has his father in him (genetically), so God was in Christ reconciling the world back to Himself. God loves the people He created, and He is unwilling to see them live enslaved to sin without providing a way out. Jesus is the way!
Jesus has already paid for your sins. All you need to do is believe it and learn how to receive what He did and has for you to begin walking in your new life. God loves the people He created, and He is unwilling to see them live enslaved to sin without providing a way out. Jesus is the way!
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