Truly He Says

“Most assuredly, I say to you, he who hears My word and believes in Him who sent Me has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death into life. John 5:24

In the King James version we get the verily, verily's, but here in the NKJV we read 'most assuredly'. I'm not sure which gives the most emphasis, but surely we are to listen and receive the words of Jesus in this. Truly He says that for the price of hearing His words and believing in God we have everlasting life, and no judgment!

That great verse, John 3:16, said much the same thing. How is it that work, effort, toil, and all the other hallmarks of religious drudgery are left out of this? Where is the peak to scale? When do we get to claim a personal victory? Notice how He speaks as though it's all done already.

For simply hearing the Word and believing in Him, I have passed from death into life. You heard Jesus and you believed in Him, welcome to life eternal. Why didn't we have to pay an entrance fee to get here?

It had to be all Him, for fallen imperfection cannot perfect another fallen imperfection or worse, itself. If a crooked building with no knowledge of how to make a straight building tried to erect another building, it too would come out crooked and both would fall. Imagine a wild animal trying to raise tame offspring. Ah, but place the wild kittens with the tame mother cat, and though the wild birth of the kittens will show, they will not be the wild animals they might have become.

We too, once saved and instructed by the Lord's Spirit, can teach and train one another. Our 'wild' sinful birth does show at times, but we are becoming daily more meek before the Lord. Great is His name in all the Earth!

Bucky