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If you think....

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  A whole lot of people out there in the world today base their lives on philosophies
such as "life is short, party hard!" and "there's always tomorrow" and "you only live once", but
they forget such sobering reminders  as "eternity is very long!" and "you only die once" (well,
physically).
	If you don't think that there is ANY possibility that eternity could exist, then go party hard
and go please yourself and you may as well not even try to be "good" because there's no reason to 
do so.  You will feel empty, hopeless and meaningless and you will jump from one thing to the next
trying to find a satisfaction that you will never find.  You will always be missing something and
never have true peace.
	If you think there might even be the SMALLEST chance that eternity could possibly exist,
then you better make it you goal every day to find out how to live eternally, because each one
of us is only one breath away from eternity.  You and I are not guaranteed another breath - we
could die at any moment.  ARE YOU READY?
  	Before you go and try every possible man-made method of "getting to God", I will tell you
right now that only in Jesus Christ will you find true peace and salvation.  Sure you can study 
Taoism or Existentialism or any other -isms, or follow hard after the teachings of Buddhism, but you 
will never find true peace in the depths of your heart.  The salvation plan of the Bible is the
only way.  	
	Romans 6:23a tells us "for the wages of sin is death. . ."  What is a "wage"? It is something
you earn.  What is "sin"?  Sin happens any time we break any of God's laws.  Several of these laws 
include not lying, not stealing, not murdering, not commiting adultery-- but Jesus said that even
if we lust in our heart, it's as if we had commited adultery in God's eyes.  The Bible also teaches
that if you break one law, you are guilty of breaking them all.  I know I have sinned, I'll readily
admit to that.  So according to Roman 6:23a, I am deserving of the "death" talked about there.  
	This death is not a physical death, although we will all go through that.  This death is a 
spiritual death- an eternal separation from God.  So, since each of us is born sinful, we are born
earning of death.  When we die outside of Jesus Christ, we die still sinful and will receive the 
eternal death we earned.  There is nothing man can do to rid himself of this sin.  You cannot simply
do enough good to "outweigh the bad".  God declares that "the wages of sin is death", therefore the
only way sin can be paid for is by spiritual separation from God in eternal punishment for disobedience,
just as the only way to pay for a speeding ticket is to pay with money.  You cannot say "well I picked
up a piece of trash that was on the street and put it in a trash container" and use that good to outweigh
the bad of your speeding ticket.  You must pay money, period.
	Romans 6:23b tells us "but, the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord."  What
is a "gift"?  It's something you receive totally free.  You can't do anything to earn a gift- 
it is, by definition, free.  What this means then is that God gave His people Jesus Christ so that
Jesus could pay the debt we owe by dying for the sin of His people on the cross.  When Jesus cried 
"Father, why have you forsaken me?" He felt the burden of the eternal death that the sin of all His
people warranted.  When He cried "It is finished," the debt of the sin of His people was paid for in
full.
	It is amazing to think about the depth of God's love that He would send His only Son to
come down to earth and be brutally killed by His own creation for sins that He didn't even commit, 
but it's not enough just to know this.  James 2:19 says that "You believe that there is one God; 
Good! Even the devils believe that, and tremble."  Therefore, it is not a matter of how much 
we know about Christ, but whether He truly has saved us.  If I am in great need of
heart surgury and know a few fantastic things about the only doctor who can help me, I will still die
within a few days unless ask that doctor to heal me.  I must put my life in his hands. Likewise with God:
If I know great things about God, of what profit is that unless I put my life and full trust in His
hands?
	The most difficult thing for a man to give up in becoming a Christian is his own free will. 
Man's flesh desires to have its own way in everything, whether he is a Christian or not.  A Christian
willingly surrenders his life to Christ and asks Christ to take control of his life, to guide him,
and to have mercy on him.  After all, we all deserve death.  Ask Him to take your life and use it 
as He wants.  It's a large step of trust, but what have you got to lose?  If God is moving in you 
heart, turn your life over to Him now!  
	If a Christian dies today and God does not exist, what has he lost?  You say "well he never
revelled in the pleasures of drunkeness, or cheated on a test to get a better grade. . .," but what
do these things matter now?  He is dead!  He also never killed any of your friends in a drunken rage,
or stole your car, or hurt your grade because he cheated on a test and killed the curve.  He had 
lived his life good, was kind to others, always helped, was honest, and desired to pass that on to 
his children.
	If a non-Christian dies today and believed his whole life that God didn't exist, and he is
wrong (God did exist), what has he lost?  EVERYTHING!!  Not only have all his possessions
become meaningless, and all his pleasures ceased, but now he will be judged by God and found guilty
of sin because his sin was not covered by the Lord Jesus Christ!  When he is judged and found guilty,
what a terrible time that will be!  He will be separated from God for all eternity in the condition
of his soul called hell.  What have you to lose by placing you trust in Jesus?  Cry out to Him for 
mercy, surrender you life to Him.  There is much more rejoicing in Heaven over one soul who has been
saved than all the souls already saved.  
	How do you know if you are truly saved?  If you have an ongoing desire to follow Christ; if it bothers
you when you commit sin; If you no longer have a desire for the things of this world which can never
satisfy; if you feel a joy and a hope; if you have a peace and take rest knowing that all things
work together for the good of them who follow Christ; if you praise God and thank Him for the good
and the bad; if you have a desire to dive into the Bible and know Jesus more, you have been, in all
likelyhood, saved.  I'm not saying that you won't have a difficult day here and there- we're still human-
but Christians constantly desire to do things God's way: "Not my will, but Yours be done." Praise
God!
	If you feel led to become a Chsitian, I will tell you this: being a Christian is not an
easy thing to be.  I want to warn you now, lest you desire to follow Christ, but later run into very
difficult times and return to your old ways.  Society is constantly against the things of God; 
non-Christians are always looking for a shortcoming in a Christian.  The people you called your
friends will mock you; you will always be in battle against you school teachers who teach that God
does not exist and man evolved from a mere animal as an accident; you will feel alone on your 
college campus or in the workplace, but take heart: God is with you, in Him shall you trust. 
Gradually, you will find more Christians with whom you can share and pray in a loving friendship 
which does not wither.  Christian friends bring tremendous encouragement and it is always a joy
to see them where you least expect them.  
 	It should be emphizised that, in this salvation plan, there is nothing we can do
to get to God.  We can't simply invent our own plan and proclaim "This is how man is saved.", NO!  
Yes, I am proposing there are even "religious" people, even devout Catholics which people would
esteem "religious" or "holy", who invent their own salvation plan.  Believe me, I know from
experience, my mom was once Catholic and I go to a Catholic University. They tried to teach me 
that we people had totally free will to accept or deny Jesus, we could turn Him on or off like a
faucet.  I followed that theology for a little while until I learned the truth. This was just another 
man-made method of the hundreds that man has created in the hope of getting themselves to God.
	The Bible speaks often comparing salvation to a new life.  In the book of John, chapter 11,
we find the account concerning Lazarus.  The Bible records that he was a stinking corpse that had
been dead for four days!  At that point, Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead!  There was no way 
that Lazarus could possibly have made a decision to be raised from the dead, or to stay dead. 
He did not have any of this "free will" to choose, it was in the hands of Jesus.  
	In Ezekiel 37, we read of the valley of dry bones that Ezekiel sees.  The dry bones 
represent the house of Israel,that is, all of God's people.  They are completely without life.  This is the 
state of a Christian before he has been given spiritual life.  Then Ezekiel sees the bones come 
together and bodies form on the bones, and the bodies are given life.  This was not an act of the bones 
wanting to have life, but rather God giving the dead bones life.  So also God must resurrect our dead 
souls, which cannot live on our own command, and give our dead soul the life: Salvation.
	How then can man be saved?  The Bible says "No one can come to the Son unless the Father
draw him." (John 6:44).  This means that God does all the saving!  We don't like this because we
want to be the ones who save ourselves.  We feel like we need to do something to pay for our debt,
but there is nothing we can do- our debt is far too great.  But this also means if we have a desire
to follow God and hate to do sin, it is because God draws us.  God has "raised us from the dead", 
much like Lazarus and like the dry bones, so that we could be his people.  
	In the New Testament, Jesus brought many back to life from the dead, but, certainly, many
more perished.  Is this fair?  Why would Jesus only cover a tiny portion of the planet and heal 
just those few?  Salvation is similar.  It may not seem fair.  God chooses those whom he will 
save and all others perish.  A youth pastor once told me that salvation is like a college class
which everyone failed.  They did not meet the standards.  They all failed, but the teacher comes 
up and says "you, you and you pass".  Why only them? Did they do better? No! They failed too!  
We have to keep in mind that God is perfect, He saves whom it is His good pleasure to save.  If
you wish that maybe you could be saved, it could very well be that God is drawing you too as one
of His.  Turn from your ways and trust in Christ; surrender you life to Him; ask him to have mercy
on you, that you might be one of His children.  If your heart is hard and you still feel that this
talk of God and Jesus Christ and salvation is not for you, maybe it is not your time to be saved,
or maybe you will not become saved.  I pray that God will weigh heavily upon your heart that you
might wrestle day and night until you come to the end of yourself and cry out that God would have
mercy on you and save you from your sins so that you might even come into 
the glorious house of the Lord on the last day.
	

	"And lo, I am with you, even to the very end of the age." Matthew 28:20b
	Praise the Lord!