Exploring Christianity
Christianity is all about Jesus, which means being a Christian is all about Jesus too.
It’s difficult to dispute that our world is in a mess – broken and corrupt. But let’s be honest – so are we. God knows that, and yet loves the world he made and the people he made to rule over his world.
So how does God deal with this clash between his anger and disappointment at the state of the world and his love for it? How does he deal with the real tension between his anger at our rebellion against him, and his love for us?
Jesus lived the perfect life – just read the gospels and see for yourself. Yet he lived in order to take God’s anger levelled at him as he died on the cross, even though he didn’t deserve it. That is why the Bible consistently calls Jesus’ death a ‘sacrifice’. He died in the place of people who really deserve God’s anger and judgement – people like us.
Yet, because Jesus was both a man and the Son of God too (again, see the claims of the Bible), he was resurrected from the dead – absorbing the punishment for our rebellion. All we need do is trust him for it.
A Christian is someone who has found they deserve God’s anger and punishment, yet also finds that Jesus has taken it for them. He has defeated selfishness, sin and death so that those who believe Jesus did it for them no longer face God’s anger and eternal judgement but can know a new life with God that last for eternity. This really does change everything – both now, and forever.
