Questions and Answers
On the Faith Journey

Why did you become a Christian?
Pastor David Yonggi Cho

"At one time the greatest goal of my life was to rise to a high position in society by becoming a great medical doctor. I had always neglected spiritual matters, at least in my thought life. I had decided not to live a religious life because every religious person I knew seemed to me to be very weak and feeble. Then I fell into a desperate situation, with no hope of surviving. I was dying of tuberculosis. During those lonely, hopeless days I did not want anything but to be restored to health.

Through my great physical need to be healed, I met Jesus! He restored me at the point of death. I probably never would have thought of a spiritual life otherwise. My spiritual eyes began to open to see spiritual truth, and I received Jesus Christ as my Savior. I found that I needed the salvation of Jesus Christ and close, daily fellowship with him more than any amount of money, position or authority. He gave me new hope through His divine healing Then I learned about the heavenly way of living on earth and the assurance that we can have eternal life.

My friend. have you experienced the joy of knowing Jesus Christ as your Savior? Is it possibly that you are establishing goals for life while making no plans regarding your eternal life? Do you have the assurance that you will be spending eternity with God in heaven?

...May I remind you that you will have attained the greatest goal in life when you become personally acquainted with Jesus Christ."

Pastor David Yonggi Cho

How do I become a Christian?

Many people come to God as a result of...

If you leave God as an unresolved question... then God may need to bring a crisis into your life to get your attention. If you leave this question until a crisis occurs you will lose control of the events. Don't you think it would be better to search for God by setting out on a spiritual journey?

Nevertheless trial and suffering are necessary growth points in life. Like a butterfly emerging from a cocoon... the struggle is necessary to become strong and equipped for life.

So how do we become personally acquainted with Jesus?

The Bible tells us that any person who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved (Romans 10:13).  Our position of humility before God is to recognise our need of Jesus and to call on him in prayer. 

Here is an example of the kind of prayer we can pray...

'Lord Jesus Christ, I need your friendship, your salvation and your order in my life. I need to get free from the sin and brokenness in my life - I need a new start and so I ask you to come into my life, and to teach me your ways. This is me God................ (your name), calling on you to be the Lord of my life.'

The exact words don't matter, it's what's on your heart that counts.

Please check out God calling for the next step on this journey.

You will also find info on transacting with God at unit 1 of the discipling course on this web site... and other helpful materials at Testimonies as well as the other sections of this page on Q&A. 

Now is a good time to share your experience with a more mature Christian friend or Pastor. May God be with you.

See also:

Entree to Faith
The Power of One Cross
On-line Course on the foundations of our faith.

Laying a Firm Foundation

What has the death of a man
to do with the forgiveness of sin?

This question, at the core of Christianity, was asked me by a 14 year old many years ago. At the time, I thought he didn't get a very good answer, and so the question has stuck with me ever since. Theologians have also written many books seeking to answer this question, so here we don’t want a technical answer or a theological dissertation - but rather a sign post which leads us quickly to a place of appreciation.

In his book, "The Cross of Christ" John Stott draws the following conclusions on this aspect of our faith:

"Therefore as we stand before the Cross, we begin to gain a clear view both of God and of ourselves, especially in relation to each other. Instead of inflicting upon us the judgment we deserved, God in Christ endured it in our place. Hell is the only other alternative. This is the ‘scandal’, the stumbling block, of the cross. For our proud hearts rebel against it. We cannot bear to acknowledge either the seriousness of our sin and guilt or our utter indebtedness to the cross (p. 161)...

The Biblical gospel of atonement is the good news of God satisfying himself by substituting himself for us. The concept of substitution may be said then, to lie at the heart of both sin and salvation…

For the essence of sin is man substituting himself for God; while the essence of salvation is God substituting himself for man.

Man asserts himself against God and puts himself where only God deserves to be; God sacrifices himself for man and puts himself where only man deserves to be.

Man claims prerogatives which belong to God alone; God accepts penalties which belong to man alone." (p. 160).

In his immortal hymn ‘Rock of Ages’, Augustus Toplady expressed it this way:

Nothing in my hand I bring,
Simply to your Cross I cling;
Naked, come to you for dress;
Helpless, look to you for grace;
Foul, I to the fountain fly;
Wash me, Savior, or I die.

"You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God's wrath through him!" (Romans 5:6-9); and...

"For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God's one and only Son. (John 3:16-18).

See also:
Entree to Faith

What form does God take?
This is a real sticking point for me.

This is a great question - and while the Bible provides many insights, ultimately you need a personal revelation from God about himself. This is why many people come to God by humbly asking him directly something like: "I want to know you God" or, " I really want to know if you are there" etc.

This relates to the following Scripture -

"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you," declares the LORD, (Jeremiah 29:11-14).

The Bible is a book of revelation about God: the reason things are like they are, what God's character and ways are like, what He is like and to do with the future. Have a read of Colossians ch 1:15 to 23 and you will read some mind boggling stuff! This is likewise expressed in John 1:10. Read also John 16:12.

In the Old Testament there is a passage recorded where God even describes himself - Exodus 34:5-7. Pretty amazing and definitely the truth. For myself, I have found you need to come to God on a "heart" level, or Spirit, as the Bible puts it -

"Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth." (John 4:23)

"To (those) who had believed him, Jesus said, "If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free." (John 8:31-32).

So in summary, we don't try to relate to God in a material way - using our five natural senses. We have to enter into a different dimension, that of Spirit, by which I allude to the Holy Spirit. We have to tune into God in this way, and the way to set your receiver is… humility: a genuine enquiry of God directly. You see God doesn't fit inside the human brain - he is far too great for that. Nope, we have to look up to him with enquiry, and then he will, bit by bit, fill in parts of the jigsaw for us.

So we relate to God by learning to love him, heart, soul and mind (Matt 22:37-40). As we make progress in this way, we are greatly encouraged to find out that he knows us really well, and that He love's us with great caring. So then we relate back again - with our intellect (learning about him in the Bible etc), with our emotions (gaining a new affection), with our body (doing right things with it), and with our spirit (prayer, awareness and communication).

This is all very real, in fact more real than a materialist could define - because it is encompassing far broader horizons, even searching the depths of eternity. To every enquiry there is a Godly answer that satisfies deep inside of us. Just look in the right places, especially the book God gave us for precisely this reason.

You ask about the form of God?: Well think about God's intellect - millions of miles (as the Bible says, as far as the east is from the west) more advanced then the smartest person. Try a love so deep that there is no end to the sacrifice God would make on your behalf, even if you were the only person who ever lived. Try an integrity that is absolute and without blemish. Try someone with the creativity to design the universe - everything you can see around you and then on to infinity. Try power - enough to make the world and to raise Jesus from the dead. Try patience -enough to reach out to us after we continually stuff up - both in your life and in the history of man.

Yes, what a great God. Just reach out - his arms and heart are open for you.