Who You Need - The Key 2 Victory

Who You Need:

Who You

Need:

Hopefully, at this point, you couldn’t care less about Kirk Gibson’s amazing home run. In light of what you’re missing in your relationship with God, since you are an imperfect human, Kirk’s hit seems way less significant. Fortunately, the key to victory doesn’t have to stop with you losing. There has been enough bad news, so here’s the good news.

God wants you back. So, He sent His one and only Son to come to live on earth, as a legit human. God has told us,

“This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world...” ( 1 John 4:9).

Not only that, but God’s son was more than a regular human, He was also God Himself! At another time God described His Son like this,

“For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form,” (Colossians 2:9).

Aka, God’s Son was both fully God and fully man.

So, what was the point of God sending His Son? Well, here’s the purpose. God’s Son, who is also called Jesus, never broke God’s law, not even once. Jesus was the only human to be perfect…ever. God said about His Son that,

“He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth” (1 Peter 2:22).

And, this wasn’t like a short stay here on earth, Jesus was born as a baby and lived for over thirty years.

It’s hard for us to relate to someone who has never done anything wrong, but that wasn’t the only incredible thing that Jesus did. After living for a little over thirty years on earth, Jesus was killed as punishment. What punishment did He die for? Simple answer, Jesus died to pay for your sins and the world’s sins. God explains it this way,

“For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God…” (1 Peter 3:18).

That’s hard to wrap your mind around, so think of it this way. Imagine that you broke your team’s rules by being late to practice. And, instead of having to run the punishment of extra sprints yourself, one of your teammates ran them for you. Your coach was satisfied with the punishment, and someone other than you paid for it. In essence, this is what Jesus did. He paid your punishment so that God Who is perfect, would be satisfied.

Now, it’s kind of easy to gloss over Jesus’ death when you don’t have the details, so let’s go a little more in-depth. The people who killed Jesus literally invented ways to make death more painful. The way Jesus died was gruesome, to say the least. Jesus received just about the most amount of torture His killers could do to His body without actually killing Him, then they put Him on a cross. They nailed Jesus’ hands and feet to this cross and then hung Him in front of the city’s people to humiliate Him. Anytime Jesus wanted a breath of air as He hung on the cross, He had to push up on His feet, further driving the nails into His body, and scraping His back against raw, splintered wood.

What makes this even more amazing, is that when Jesus was going through all this, remember after doing nothing wrong His entire life, He could have abandoned the plan and decided to have God save Him at any time…but He didn’t. Why did Jesus stay on that cross? Very simply, Jesus knew that the only way you and every other human could experience the glory God created you for, was by taking your punishment through death. God said that Jesus paid for our sins on the cross,

“by becoming a curse for us,” (Galatians 3:13).

Jesus’ love for you kept Him on that cross. God said,

“But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8).

So, how can the story get any crazier? Well, that was actually all build up. Now for the real action. Jesus died. Like really died. Like dead, dead. Not like how you feel after running sprints, but like no life, starting to stink, absolutely dead. Yes, He died…but then He came back to life! God said,

“By his power God raised the Lord from the dead, and he will raise us also” (1 Corinthians 6:14).

Jesus conquered death once and for all so that those who believe in Him can have the true victory of being reunited with God. That means you can be brought back into the relationship with God that He originally intended you to have with Him and that you can live forever in victory! When Jesus was on earth He said,

“I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die;” (John 11:25).

God can free you from your punishment because Jesus paid it for you. Now God says,

“Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus,” (Romans 8:1).

But, before we leave this part, you might be wondering, why did Jesus have to come back to life? Well, do you remember your teammate who was running sprints for you? If he had to keep running, and running, and running, what would that mean? It would mean the coach was never satisfied with the punishment. Remember, death is punishment for your sins. When Jesus came back to life, that signified that God, Who is perfect, was satisfied with Jesus’ payment and could now be reunited with His creation because their sins had been paid for. Since Jesus was willing to pay the punishment for the sins of all the world, you can now be restored to God! God says it best,

“But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Corinthians 15:57).

Jesus’ did it for you and not only is that absolutely, positively, without a doubt, the most clutch play in human history, but it’s also the key to victory in your own life.

Now, it’s how you respond to this good news that will determine your future.