The question remains, “How can God be just—that is, true to Himself in nature and true to Himself in holiness—and yet justify the sinner?” Because each man had to bear his own sins, all mankind was excluded from helping, since each was contaminated with the same disease. The only solution was for an innocent party to volunteer to die physically and spiritually as a substitution before God. This innocent party would have to take man’s judgment, penalty, and death. But where was such an individual? Certainly, there was none on earth. There was only one possibility. God’s own Son was the only personality in the universe who had the capacity to bear in His own body the sins of the world. Only God’s Son was infinite and thus able to die for all.The question remains, “How can God be just—that is, true to Himself in nature and true to Himself in holiness—and yet justify the sinner?” Because each man had to bear his own sins, all mankind was excluded from helping, since each was contaminated with the same disease. The only solution was for an innocent party to volunteer to die physically and spiritually as a substitution before God. This innocent party would have to take man’s judgment, penalty, and death. But where was such an individual? Certainly, there was none on earth. There was only one possibility. God’s own Son was the only personality in the universe who had the capacity to bear in His own body the sins of the world. Only God’s Son was infinite and thus able to die for all.
How is Christianity different from every other religion in the world? The answer focuses on Jesus Christ, “the Son of the living God” (Matthew 16:16).
Christ means “anointed one.” It is the term for the ancient Hebrew word Messiah—the anointed one whom God would send to save His people. The first believers of the early Christian church recognized Jesus as the Messiah promised in the Old Testament. Their period of world history was full of discouragement and despair. The promised Messiah shone as a beacon in the darkness, and His light has never dimmed: “In Him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. … The true Light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world” (John 1:4, 9).
Today, as world leaders struggle with seemingly insurmountable problems, this darkening and menacing situation accentuates the brightness of the One who proclaimed, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows Me will never walk in darkness, but have the light of life” (John 8:12).
Jesus alone can offer eternal life because He is the only one who lived a sinless life and provided the perfect sacrifice for our sins by His death on the cross. He lived on earth as man, but was also divine. Because He was divine, He rose again three days after His death—the only one ever to die and come back to life on His own—then ascended into heaven. While the founders of various non-Christian religions of the world have died and been buried, Christ is very much alive!
Jesus was the only one to claim to be God and the only one to prove it. In His words, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:6).
Because the Bible is God’s inspired Word and God cannot lie, it does not contradict itself or teach falsehoods. It is in this very Scripture that Jesus is revealed.
Billy Graham devotion