Some Good News

                    If you’ve made it this far in the website, you’re probably looking for something.  We here at Plaza Heights Student Ministries think that everyone is looking for something.  The problem is most people don’t what they’re looking for, much less where to start looking.  Every athlete who devotes their life to winning some particular prize, every businessman who wants to make VP by age 30, and every strung-out Meth head all have something in common--they’re looking for validation of who they are as a person and why they matter.

                 We believe that each of us matter and have infinite worth and value as human beings.  Not because we’re so great, but because we were all created by God for the purpose of a relationship with him.  God designed us to rely on Him for love and validation and our identity.  So what happened?  You may have heard of a story from the Bible about Adam and Eve and some fruit and a talking snake.  You can read it for yourself here, but it’s mostly a heartbreaking tale of when the first human beings decided to believe the lies of a snake and betrayed their Creator in search of their own independence.  Well, we’ve found that independence from God as humans, and it has only brought us misery.  That independence from God is called sin in the Bible.  It’s an ugly 3 letter word, but it explains how we find ourselves in the midst of a world with wars, terrorism, hate, lies, corporate fraud, broken families, gossip, and death all around us.  Our sin not only cost us a relationship with God in this life, but also leads to a just punishment for our betrayal of God after death in a place called Hell forever.  God is a just and good king of the universe who cannot allow sin to go unpunished.

               That all said, the Bible tells us of plans set in motion to solve the problem of sin and bring us back to God into the relationship our lives were meant for.  The first half of the Bible, the Old Testament, tells us of how God prepared, protected, and preserved a people for Himself that would bring about the ultimate rescue of humanity from our pitiful state of sin and death.   The second half of the Bible introduces us to the source of rescue, Jesus Christ.  The name Jesus itself means “rescue,” and He entered the world for the purpose of doing just that. You can read about Jesus here in one of 4 viewpoints of his life written by his followers.  You may know Jesus as a baby in a manger with angels and shepherds and “3 kings of Orient Are” from seeing a neighbor’s Christmas display.  You may not know that he lived a perfect life, traveling around teaching, healing the sick, casting out evil spirits from people, and hanging out with social outcasts of his day.  He lived like no other human being ever did.  And he claimed to be God. His miracles show it, his teachings were divine rather than human (What human being says, “turn the other cheek” and “pray for your enemies”?!!), and he loved people that only God could love.  And his claims of being God angered people of power in his day, and so they executed him on a Roman cross after a horrible mistrial.

                For many, the story serves only as yet another tragic death of an otherwise “good guy.”  However, Jesus did not stay dead.  They buried him after he died on the cross, but three days later, he rose again.  This was the ultimate proof that he was God.  Not only did he come back from the dead, but he was seen by hundreds of people before he returned to his Father in Heaven.  God in human flesh showed up on earth, lived a perfect life, died, was buried, and rose again from the dead.  Still with me?

                So what does that have to do with you?  What does that have to do with that aching hole in your heart that sin has created?  Remember that God must punish sin?  Jesus, innocent, died a death he did not earn.  And that death counts in God’s eyes for the sins of the guilty.  Basically, he took our death sentence on himself, and now we can be forgiven and declared innocent by God because of Jesus.  How does this happen?  Repent and believe the Gospel.  The Gospel means “good news”, and what was just described about Jesus taking our punishment for sin is good news indeed!   No Hell, no condemnation, no more broken relationship with God!  So we must repent of our sin (that means not only being sorry for what we’ve done, but changing our minds to not do it anymore) and place our faith (Bible word for dependence and trust) in what Jesus has done for us.  He conquered sin and death, and now we can have a relationship with God that we were created to enjoy.

                 If you’re still here, and your heart is agreeing with what you’ve read, that’s God’s spirit talking to to you.  God has initiated this relationship and now it’s your turn to respond.  How?  Talk to God.  Say something like, “Father, I agree with you that the choices in my life have been against you.  I have sinned.  I know that I cannot fix this on my own, so I am depending on you to save me, believing that your Son Jesus died and rose again for my sin and so I could have a relationship with you.  Please forgive me and give me new life.  I ask this because of what Jesus has done for me.  Amen.”

                If you’ve talked to God in this way and were genuine in what you said, you are now God’s child and that relationship is restored.  Now you can live the life he always meant you to live.  Part of being God’s child is being part of His family.   You need other followers of Jesus Christ to help and support you. Send us an email here at Plaza Heights Student Ministries.  No matter where you live, what age you are, etc. we will try and help you find a local group of other Christians.  We would also love to hear what God has done in your life and how we can pray for you.