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Titus 2:14
14 Who [hos] gave [didomi] himself [heautou] for [huper] us [hemon], that [hina] he might redeem [lutroo] us [hemas] from [apo] all [pas] iniquity [anomia], and [kai] purify [katharizo] unto himself [heautou] a peculiar [periousios] people [laos], zealous [zelotes] of good [kalos] works [ergon]. KJV-Interlinear
14 who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself a people for His own possession, zealous for good deeds. NASB
Jesus Christ is the one who gave Himself, or placed Himself, in our place, in order to save us from inevitable destruction.
God is life, but more than that, life comes complete with security, happiness, self-awareness, a sense of purpose and worth, a destiny of value, the ability to enjoy ones existence, the ability to provide for ones self.
Anything that is apart from God, does not have these characteristics. Being apart from life means that you have to produce your own security, your own self support, make your own provision in every aspect of life, and no one is capable of doing this.
Look what God has done in order to bring life and support to humanity. For one thing He created an entire universe, an entire planet, water, food, air to breathe. He created an entire social structure, economic structure, everything that you are able to observe in life, and far, far more.
None of us can do any of that.
God is perfect. Man is born out of sin. Sin is the degeneracy, the corruption of ones self.
Have you ever placed a slab of meat out at room temperature? What happens to it? It begins to spoil and rot. Have you ever seen a rotten slab of meat heal itself? No.
Anything of corruption cannot fix itself. Only God, who is incorruptible, is able to cure the corrupt. The corrupt cannot cure itself.
So, Jesus Christ came to this earth in the form of perfect humanity, and took over the penalty of sin (corruption) and paid its price in our behalf. This gives each one of us the opportunity to regain our lost eternal life, with God at the helm of life, not ourselves.
Those who reject Christ believe by default that they can control their own destiny, and when they die, they realize that they are absolutely powerless to control anything. They cannot control their life, their location, the environment around them. They cannot control the universe and the powers that control the universe, and the realm beyond death, or anything else that we have no clue as to what might still be out there, that we have yet to discover.
Just a couple of centuries ago, man knew nothing about galaxies, or atoms, or genetics, or gravity, or magnetic fields. And today, there are theories of still more complex dimensions that help bleed off the phenomenal power of gravity, into other dimensions, so that we might not be crushed by it all. Mind boggling things that we usually see only in science fiction movies. And yet do we resort to believing that the world is flat, that we are the center of the universe, that witches should be burned, that some people are superior to others?
When beliefs exclude God and doctrine, then anything can become acceptable. When God is rejected, then we do not realize just how inferior we are.
God (Christ) redeemed us. He paid a ransom for our life. By paying that ransom, He now owns us, and we belong to Him. However God does not wish to make us human slaves, so He has given all the opportunity for freedom with Him, or by ones self.
To believe in Christ means that He will receive us as His own. To reject Christ means that He will graciously bow out of our life and we can continue on in our existence to the best of our ability. Unfortunately, man has no ability, and the Lake of Fire, which is a realm of an uncontrollable environment, is where unbelievers end up.
Try jumping into an active volcano and command the fires to cool. You can’t. Try commanding the wind. You can’t. Try solving the world’s economic problems by tomorrow. You can’t. Try stopping your own heartbeat for an hour and then restarting it. You can’t.
In fact if you have been with this study for any length of time, then you know that it is God (Christ) who controls every aspect of life, not humanity.
By giving ourselves over to Christ, we then gain our freedom and much, much more, rather than losing it.
Unbelievers seek their own independence, believing that they have the ability to control their own existence, but lose their independence and life, through their bad choice in rejecting God, who controls every aspect of reality.
We were redeemed, ransomed, from every lawless deed (from the power of sin), and for the purpose of being purified (being cleansed from ongoing corruption). Salvation begins the process, and spiritual growth makes our existence and transformation even better.
This God does for those who belong to Him, and those who belong to Him are those who choose to belong to Him. God never coerces anyone do follow Him.
‘Zealous for good deeds,’ is a reference to those who pursue their spiritual growth to maturity. As you advance in your spiritual life, then the grace provisions become greater and greater (Book of James).
So why can’t people see the advantage of being with God? Because arrogance blinds people to the truth of reality around them, and prevents them from seeing it. And arrogance causes people to embrace the lies of this world, and desiring them instead.
Unfortunately it is only when a spiritually negative person has died that the blinders come off and by seeing the activity of angels, by seeing heavens activities, and more, do they realize that they have been foolish beyond their wildest dreams.
And yet, everyone knows of God, of Christ, of the many aspects of this world. They just choose to ignore them. After all, they are smarter than truth!!!
Unless you want to be one of the dummies who discover their dumbness after death, then your best course of action is to get with your own daily study of doctrine, and begin the long and drawn out process of growing up in your spiritual life.
There are no tricks, no gimmicks, no shortcuts to learning and living a lifetime of doctrine, in less than a lifetime.
