Belief is Everything: 1 John 3c thru 2 Johna

Everywhere in Scripture, the main thing always comes down to belief; simple, childlike belief, that what has been written in the Word is true.

Our belief is a testimony that God has gotten through to us. Absent the Spirit of God, we would not believe. Others have seen greater miracles than we. Pharaoh, and the Scribes and Pharisees, saw everything. They saw the Nile River turned to blood. They saw Lazarus walking again. And if seeing is believing, they must have believed something.

But they did not believe that Jesus was God's son. We are asked to believe it, without ever seeing it with our fleshly eyes. It would seem like a herculean task for us. Yet it is what me must do. And we would not believe, if there were no Spirit of God; if there were no truth in which to trust.

And if we did not believe; if we chose to turn from the belief . . . where would we go? People will still die - that we know quite empirically. The biblical record is adamant and inescapable on this point: we die. I will die and you will die. God's Word is validated.

So I ask you, where will you turn? Can you find something, or someone, that can reverse that which you have seen with your own eyes . . . the death of a loved one? Or will you really stretch your imagination and put your trust in some belief system that says that what you see with your own eyes, death, is not the truth.

Trust your senses! Death is real! And only one person in history has ever done anything to reverse it's horror! Only Jesus of Nazareth has ever claimed to have conquered death! If you can see death with your own eyes; test for no pulse, detect an absence of breathing . . . if you can testify that the dead rot after so many days - then why, dear friend, do you find it such a stretch to believe that the same process can be reversed?

Only one man in history has ever done anything to defeat, or to cheat, death! Why do you not make that your starting point in your journey to eternal truth?

Who is the conqueror of the world if not for the person who believes that Jesus is the son of God?

Of course there is a Creator, someone greater than us! Of course there is One Who knows it all (since we clearly do not!)

And if there is a Creator that has let us endure this long . . . does it not make sense that He would want to build us into people with whom He could fellowship? Is it really such a stretch to say that He would want us to live forever? And would there not be some plan that would make such human eternals worthy to live forever?

If you seek a solution to death, look to the one with the solution. If you have conquered death, you have conquered the world.

Believe.