18+ General Discussion Forum

Interesting discussion.

I'm essentially agreeing with the previous post, but presenting an additional perspective.

I think a lot of people get stuck on the thought of "Why is it so important for me to follow Christ" as though they would be giving themselves over into some sort of existential slavery. People interpret the Gospel as a narrow, arbitrary call to follow some leader that they may not believe in. After all, if you're doing good works, who cares about being a literal Christian?

Well, another perspective could be described this way: The Bible doesn't push us toward Christ simply for matters of loyalty, but for matters of necessity. According to scripture, all human beings are born dead spiritually, and have been that way since the fall of Adam. This renders it impossible for them to relate to God on a true, eternal level. Because of the inescapable nature of this type of humanity, people are seen as doomed--they cannot coexist with a holy God in a holy, spiritual place. They are nothing but a mass of corrupt, sinful flesh by nature. Thus, the only way for mankind to be reconciled back to its former station in communion with God was for a complete rehaul. This rehaul would be the most important thing to occur in human history. It would take the form of Christ.

God's ultimate plan was to happily dwell with glorified people on a perfect, glorified Earth, and according to the New Testament, that plan became tied to the redemptive work of Christ. The necessity of Christ would be manifested in the fact that if His own righteous spirit did not dwell in us, then there would be no conceivable way to exist righteously in the presence of God upon leaving this Earth--regardless if we did nothing but good deeds in our time here. The good deeds hold no water because they are base, physical interactions. They mean nothing in the eternal, spiritual scope of the universe. Only a physiospiritual being with Christ's spirit quickening it on the inside could achieve the Final Reward.

This just goes to show, in my opinion, that nobody has really done anything to merit entering Heaven. It was God's action of love/ forgiveness (upon acceptance by the human individual) that facilitated mankind's recovery.

Hope this wasn't too long.

Um...err...writing is cool.