How Can I Know God and His Son, Jesus?

February 2021

It was never God's intention for us to find religion or knowledge and earn our way to Heaven.  Some people have tried to follow the Ten Commandments and found it too hard and given up. And that makes sense because the Israelites in the Old Testament also found it was beyond them and God gave them a further option of once every year they would symbolically put all the sins of the people on the 'scapegoat' and send the goat off into the arid desert to perish. But then, they faced another year of trying and failing. Short Answer - by ourselves we cannot acquit ourselves to join God in Heaven at the end of our years on earth.

Only one thing separates you from a relationship with God—sin. We sin whenever we fail to live by the Lord’s expectation. In fact, Romans 3:23: “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”    No matter how hard we try, we cannot save ourselves or get rid of our sins. We can’t earn our way to heaven by being good, going to church, or being baptized. 

God knew how helpless we are because of our sins, God sent His only Son, Jesus, to save us.

Jesus Christ lived a perfect, sinless life, and then died on the cross to pay the penalty for our sins.  Romans 5:8-10  says But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners.  And since we have been made right in God’s sight by the blood of Christ, he will certainly save us from God’s condemnation. Three days after Jesus died on the Roman cross, He rose from the dead—showing that He had triumphed over sin and death once and for all.

Romans 10:9 promises, “If you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.” If you have not yet begun your personal relationship with God, understand that the One who created you loves you no matter who you are or what you’ve done. He wants you to experience the profound depth of His love.

If you want to meet Jesus and accept His gift of life eternal and have all your sin washed clean so that it will never be remembered again you should pray with simple words that acknowledges

that Jesus is the Son of God and that His death and resurrection has provided you a way back to God, the Father.

David and Cherie Rodway

Who Is This Jesus Who Came!

January 2021

Ever lost track of someone? Maybe out shopping in a busy mall with young children and one of them slips away unnoticed? Sometimes we reach a point in life where we are curious about our forebears; who are we and how did we come to be?  There is an internal reaction. Anxiety, horror, and curiosity, intrigue - what is your inside person saying to you? 

We all have an inside part of us that is looking for completion.  That is because we have been created in three parts. Our physical body; our soul or emotions and will and mind and a spirit, the real essence of who we are.

Good eating, exercise and healthy living takes care of our physical body.

School, books, friendship and family help to create a balanced emotional life with strong ethics and good knowledge.

But there is only one answer for our spirit to find peace. God made sure that the void on the inside of us was compatible only with His Son who came to earth to complete the rescue plan of all God's lost children.

In December we celebrated the coming of Jesus to earth. 

In this first month of a new year, how well do you know Jesus?  Have you accepted His offer of Salvation and New Way of Living?  Peace, joy, and acceptance will fill your inside person with contentment and purpose when you do. The Bible promises that when we believe He is the Son of God who died on our behalf to take the punishment of our sin, even though He had never sinned, and that we confess Him as Lord or the Boss in our life, we have God's permission to call ourselves children of God.  You can read that in the Bible in John 1:12. 

David and Cherie Rodway

The Gift of Life!

December 2021

For four years Emperor Theodore III of Ethiopia had held a group of fifty-three European captives (thirty adults and twenty-three children), including some missionaries and a British consul.

By letter Queen Victoria pleaded in vain with Theodore to release the captives, who were held in a remote nine-thousand-foot-high bastion deep in the interior.

Finally, the queen ordered a full-scale military expedition from India to march into Ethiopia, not to conquer the country and make it a British colony, but simply to rescue a tiny band of civilians. The invasion force included thirty-two thousand men, heavy artillery, and forty-four elephants to carry the guns. Provisions included fifty thousand tons of beef and pork and thirty thousand gallons of rum.

Engineers built landing piers, water treatment plants, a railroad, and a telegraph line to the interior, plus many bridges.

All of this was necessary to fight one decisive battle, after which the prisoners were released. Then everyone packed up and went home. The release of a few cost the British Government millions of dollars.

We have a similarly powerful force applied to our deliverance.

Jesus is God’s costly rescue program and he was designed for it, not resigned to it.

At this Christmas Season take time to look past the tinsel and carols and take a long look at the Best Gift of All that cost God the giving of His Only Son for a people who were isolated and imprisoned by sin and selfish living. Totally unable to save ourselves, our Heavenly Father was prepared to pay an immense price and His Son was equally committed to giving His everything to rescue mankind from their hopeless plight.

Merry Christmas!

David and Cherie Rodway