Sunday, May 3, 2009
What do you know for sure?
What do you know for sure?
This is a common greeting among friends. The answer is usually, "nothing much" or on occasion, "The only the thing that you can know for sure is death and taxes."
Is this really the only thing that we can know for sure?
In fact there is something else that we can know for sure and that is the matter of our soul's salvation.
I was raised in a church tradition that taught this is not possible. In fact it is considered a "presumptuous sin". That is, it is a matter for God alone to decide and it would largely be dependent on well or how poorly we behaved in life.
What does God Himself tell us in His Word, the Holy Bible?
He tells us by His apostle, John that;
"These things are written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God that you may know that you have eternal life." 1 John 5:13
A little further on this same man writes:
"We know that we are of God and that the whole world lies in wickedness. We know that the Son of God is come and has given us understanding that we may know Him that is true, even His Son, Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life." 1 John 19:20
The man that wrote these things was one who walked with Jesus Christ and testified to the miracles, the teachings, the death, burial and bodily resurrection of the Lord that proved that this mere carpenter's son was in fact the Son of God, the Messiah.
Furthermore, John wrote that it is through this man, the Lord Jesus Christ, anyone can know they are saved or that they are still lost. That is because it is not dependent upon our works, but rather we must be born again through the work of the Lord Himself.
Another apostle, Paul wrote:
"For it is by grace that you are saved, through faith and that not of yourselves for it is the gift of God, not of works, so that no one can boast." Ephesians 2:8
So what is it that you know for sure?