God is the Creator of the universe. In the beginning, God made the world. He made everything that we see and don’t see. Everything God created was good. He made the first human beings, Adam and Eve, and told them to be fruitful and multiply. God continues to “knit humans together” in our mothers’ wombs. He sustains all life as we know it.
Adam and Eve were good but not incapable of disobeying God’s commands. He only gave them one rule, and they broke it. That’s called sin. Sin ruined everything. All that was once good became tainted and corrupt. Their disobedience broke Adam and Eve’s relationship with each other, God, and the rest of creation. Creation is now malfunctioning and out of order.
As Adam and Eve’s descendants, the Bible says we all sin and fall short of the glory of God. God says that He looks down from heaven to see if anyone is good (never lying, cheating, stealing, lusting, or doing good things with selfish motives), but there isn’t even one person. Not one. Sin separates us from God. He gave us life and breath, but we use that life to disobey and disrespect Him. The punishment for that is eternal separation from Him.
As the Bible says, the wages of sin is death, but that same verse says the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus. Jesus lived a sinless life, fulfilling God’s requirements and obeying God’s law perfectly in our place. Then He died a substitutionary death, taking on the punishment we deserve and absorbing the full wrath of God on the cross. God raised Him from the dead three days after the crucifixion. Now He sits at God’s side, interceding for us. God calls us to confess with our mouths and believe with our hearts that Jesus is the Son of God. He calls us to believe that His perfect life, substitutionary death, and glorious resurrection are ultimately for us. If we accept this, God the Father executes a beautiful trade on our behalf. He transfers our sin debt into Jesus’ account (in His name) and Christ’s perfect righteousness into our account ( in our name). He removes our sins from us as far as the east is from the west, and it’s as if we never sinned.
If any man is in Christ, he becomes a new creation. God clears our name and gives us Jesus’ record and His reward. He even adopts us as His children! We are heirs to God’s blessings and promises in Christ.
When Christ returns, the old heaven and earth will pass away, and all things will become new. God will give His adopted children glorified bodies. Death, sin, and all the consequences of a fallen, broken world will be no more. At the throne of Grace, every knee will bow, and every tongue will confess that He is Lord! Come, Lord Jesus!
Gospel-Centered Joy 