Love Liberates
You Win
by
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Our faith in God not like a "wager" or a “gamble” with no guarantee of a reward. This is no "leap of faith" into nothingness, oblivious as to the outcome of our trust. There is no room here for "angst", because our salvation does not depend on anything we can do, but only on God's mercy. There is no possibility of despair. If we fail in our efforts to please God, His love and forgiveness still remains. We know that God loves us no matter what, as long as we believe in Him.
This is not a "bad faith" move. This is the "Real McCoy". It is like being told that we have won the grand prize and all we have to do in order to claim the prize is to accept God's promise of love and believe that the prize is ours.
God the Father invites us to step into a love relationship with Him. God the Son made that love relationship with God possible again through His life, death and resurrection. God the Holy Spirit enables us (in His presence) to believe in God's love offer of salvation--call it the "Holy Spirit Rescue".
So! If you have ears to hear, then hear and respond! Believe!
Pull that trigger of faith and you will not only be saved through your faith in Jesus Christ, but you will also be glorified with Him some day in heaven. (Rom. 8: 30) And be thankful! It is only because of God's great mercy and love that we can be saved through the blessed presence of his Holy Spirit. This is not of ourselves! It is the gift of God through hearing the Word of redemption and sanctification in Jesus Christ. Our confession should always be, "Thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ". (I Cor. 15: 57)
God so loved all of us that he sent his only Son, Jesus Christ, to make the supreme sacrifice at Calvary for the sins of the whole world. And...God has sent his Holy Spirit as a Comforter to enable us to respond in faith to this wonderful, expansive love of God that is offered to every one of us. Whoever believes in Jesus can now be brought into a union of love--with God, with Jesus and with the Holy Spirit--a union so beautiful as to resemble the perfect marriage made in heaven. Do you see how God's love liberates?
God's love; His agape was shown to us in the sacrificial death of Jesus Christ, his Son, on the cross of Calvary. God's love is freely offered to us as a blessing through the work of his Holy Spirit in our hearts. When the Spirit comes like a wind (pneuma) or like a breath of fresh air, He gives us the freedom to believe and to respond to God with a similar agape-type love.
GOD'S LOVE LIBERATES! YOU CAN WIN!
This could be your existential moment! This could be your grand prize! It is the greatest gift you can ever receive when you are privileged to hear the "good news" of the gospel that is meant for whoever, because you are thus enabled with the help of God’s Holy Spirit to respond in faith. "God so loved the world that he gave his only Son that who-so-ever believeth in Him should not perish, but have eternal life." (John 3: 16) Praise God! Hallelujah!
The love of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit enables us through the hearing of the gospel message to respond in faithfulness and righteousness, to become what God always wanted us to be: His children, His bride, His beloved. Someday, some glad morning, the wedding feast of the Lamb will take place in all of its fullness. We, the redeemed, will be fully adorned as the bride of Christ. (Rev. 19: 7) The faithful will then hear these words spoken to them again as an invitation, "Come unto me, all you who labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest." (Matt. 11: 28) At that time the faithful will know the full reality of heaven.
Do you want to know how you can go to heaven?
Live by the Spirit! Walk in the Spirit! Sow to the Spirit! Be led by the Spirit! (Gal. 5: 16-18, 25) Listen for and respond to the Spirit of God and Jesus Christ in your life and you will inherit eternal life!
Wake up! This is could be your moment! This could be your day!
God has promised. "In these last days I will pour out my Spirit on all people, and anyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved." (Acts 2: 17, 18--quoted from Joel 2: 2) This is the Word of the Lord, and wherever the Word is proclaimed, the Spirit is present to enable you to believe, so this could be your God-moment!
Do not receive the grace of God in vain, for he says, "In the time of my favor I heard you, and in the day of salvation I helped you. I tell you, 'Now is the time of my favor. Now is the day of salvation". (2 Cor. 6: 2)
"Wake up, sleeper! Wake up! Arise from the dead and Christ will shine on you!" (Eph. 5: 14) When the Spirit of the Lord blows on you, giving you ears to hear, then hear! Respond to the offer of God's love and salvation. God's love is the greatest gift you could ever possibly receive--the gift of heaven right now and later on in a future life.
For the sake of others who have not heard, spread the Word around. God's love offered at Calvary is not meant for “the few”. God's love is big. His love is wide and expansive and comprehensive and powerful. Above all, God's love is merciful and gracious and his love is meant for every single person on this earth.
That's huge! No wonder it is called "good news". So! Ask people! Ask everyone you meet! Do you want to go to heaven? Do you have ears to hear? Then hear!
God loves you! Christ died for you! Christ died for others too!
We get to heaven by God's grace through hearing the message of God's love in Jesus Christ, and responding to it in true faith with the help of the Holy Spirit who enables us to believe. "The Lord is the Spirit and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty." (2 Cor. 3: 17)
God is Love. Love is what God is all about and God's love will liberate anyone and everyone, if they will only believe and put their faith in Him.
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About the Book
Anthon Houtsma graduated from Calvin College in 1967 and from Calvin Seminary in 1970 with the intention of becoming a pastor in the Christian Reformed Church. Unforeseen circumstances forced his life in a very different direction, however, to a career in the US Postal Service. Anthon is a Calvinist with an existential point of view. He desperately wants you to know that God loves every person in this world. The question is: How can the love of God offered in the sacrifice of Jesus Christ save us; how can that love of God redeem the soul of any man, woman, or child, giving them a desire to serve God with their hearts and minds and strength? It is only by the grace of God and through the existential exercise of our faith that we can be saved.
“God is Love” (1 John 4:8). The attribute of love defines the purpose and goal of God with regard to all of humanity. God may hate sin, but He loves the sinner. God loves every single one of us, and He vows to raise us out of our selfish, quarrelsome lives of sin into a loving, brotherly, peaceful life of righteousness, if only we will believe.
Out of love, God sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to live among us, to die for our sins, and to be raised for our justification and sanctification. The birth of Christ was God’s promise of love to you and me—that He would freely give us the gift of salvation in Jesus Christ if only we would sincerely ask Him for it.
Jesus is the love of God that can redeem humanity. Because of God’s love and the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, heaven can now be yours if you will only put your trust in the salvation of the cross and resurrection. Through faith in Jesus Christ, you can now have a new and glorious future in heaven. God’s love liberates! You can win!
About the Author
Anthon Houtsma is a retired postal worker who graduated from Calvin College in 1967 and from Calvin Seminary in 1970 with a goal of becoming a pastor in the Christian Reformed Church.
He did for a short time pursue a Master of Divinity degree at Calvin Seminary. However, unforeseeable circumstances forced his life in a very different direction.
If he had finished his master’s degree, his thesis might have sounded very much like what he has written here, only forty years earlier and with much less practical insight which, he says, he gained from all those years of thought and experience. Life can be a great teacher when your life is lived in the presence of Jesus Christ and His Holy Spirit.