In our last lesson we learned that no matter how hard we try we can never live a perfect life. Because of our great -grandfather Adam, our natures were changed making it impossible for us to do this. That’s why God had to come up with a plan where He could save us because He loved us so much and He knew that we could never make it on our own. This plan is what we will be studying today. It is called “the gospel” which means good news because that’s exactly what it is for us.

Note: Because God loved us so much He didn’t want us to be destroyed. So He needed to come up with a plan where He could rescue us. But because He Himself could not break His own laws He couldn’t just forgive us. He needed to work within His own laws so the plan became kind of tricky to do. It had to be perfect!

Note: This part is really cool! Because we sinned we had to die. God could have us all die or He could choose one person to represent the whole human race to die for us all. That person was Jesus. But because Jesus was God, He needed to become a human being in order to qualify to represent us. That’s why He came down to this earth as a little baby. But God also did something wonderful when Jesus was born. He tied the whole human race to Jesus at His birth so that when Jesus lived a perfect life it could be credited to us. Because we were all “in Adam” when He sinned now God came up with a plan where we could all be “in Christ” so that we could all be rescued!

Note: When Jesus died on the cross for us, something wonderful happened! Because the Father tied the whole human race to Jesus when He was born, His death freed all of us from the penalty of death. But not only that- it gave us a whole new history “in Christ”.

Many people believe that salvation is just about the forgiveness of sins. They believe that it’s as though our sins are written on a blackboard and that Jesus is like an eraser and erases them. But this is not what the Bible teaches! Yes, our sins are written like on a blackboard and are erased by Jesus, but then every good and holy and perfect act that Jesus ever did when He was on this earth gets credited to us and is now written on our blackboards! This is the incredible good news of the gospel! You are now considered “holy” by God even though you may not feel it!

Note: The moment you believe the good news and trust in God for your salvation then God considers you “in Christ”

Note: If you refuse this gift then you will not have salvation no matter how many good works you have done. You have to trust in Jesus for salvation!

Note: God now considers you perfect no matter how sinful you may feel. We don’t have to worry about our salvation and we now have peace with God because when He died, we were all “in Him” at the cross. It’s almost as though you were in a race and one of the bigger kids was your partner. He decides to carry you on his back because he knows you can’t run as fast as he can. If he is the first one to cross the finish line are you also considered the winner? Yes, because you were together with him. He carried you! And it’s the same way with Jesus. 

Because Jesus died on the cross the Father now considers you “holy”! The Father tied you together with Christ when He was born and so you are now considered “righteous” because of the perfect life Jesus lived. He “won” the race and so have you “in Him”.

Note: God has given all of us a choice. We can either decide to be “in Adam” or in “Christ”. There is no middle ground. It was not our fault that we were born “in Adam”, but it is our fault if we decide not to be” in Christ”. If your “big brother” offered to run a race for you that you could not possibly win and you reject his offer, then it’s your own fault that you didn’t win.

Conclusion: Jesus gave us all a new life by coming down to this earth and living a perfect life for you and me. When we accept Jesus, every good and holy and perfect act that Jesus performed on this earth now gets credited to us. It’s a little like your parents playing a perfect game for you and then you are considered the winner. We can never be good enough on our own for Heaven, so God sent Jesus to be perfect for us. All we have to do is to accept Him.

Dear God,
Thank you so much for rescuing me from death. You loved me enough to come up with a plan to save the whole world. I want to be “in Christ” and I trust in you alone for my salvation. Help me to trust you more with my life and to believe in you.