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Faith Paralysis Vs. Faith Dividends Series
Contributed by Dev Prasad Cruz on Sep 28, 2013 (message contributor)
Summary: Happiness may depend on happenings but, our Joy definitely comes only from Jesus.
In him was life and that life was the light of men.” “To all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God.” (John 1:4 & 12).
The science of Biology tells us that human life on earth is sustained by water, food, light and oxygen. And we also read in Bible that we shall have eternal life only if we believe in Jesus which also denotes that we shall perish if we do not accept ‘Him’ as our Savior. Jesus stressed that, “if you do not believe that I am [the one I claim to be], you will indeed die in your sins” (John 8:24). However, around us today we see a great deal of ‘Faith Paralysis’ since there is an acute dearth of comprehension of the paradigms of ‘Faith Dividends’ being received by those who have absolute faith in Christ Jesus. To be précised, there prevails a total lack of understanding of what faith in Jesus stands for in our Christian Life. This humble dissertation endeavors to explore the essence of how lifeless our lives can turn out to be at the end, if we simply recite the name of Jesus for namesake without absolute faith in Him & not firmly believing in His words and on the other hand, how magnificently magnified the joy of living entails for those who live in & for Jesus.
Jesus proclaimed to be our sufficiency by teaching that He is the 5-Fundamentals of the Christian “Faith Dividends” for truly believing in Jesus as "I AM," namely
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The Bread & Water - to give life and sustenance (“Then Jesus declared, I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty.” John 6:35)
The Light - to give knowledge and enlightenment (“I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life." John 8:12)
The Truth - to lead the way to God ("I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me”. John 14:6)
The Spiritual Oxygen – His word through His gospel that escort us in our journey to Divinity by anchoring us to the ‘faith’ in God (“Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith.” Hebrews 12:2)
The Salvation – by getting Himself gruesomely crucified on the horrendous cross under the tyranny of foreign Roman rule, He leads us to promised life hereafter (“I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies.” John 11:25 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.” John 3:16
Wouldn’t it be phenomenally divine to live without (1) hunger & thirst, (2) walking in the brilliance of the light of life, (3) truthfully towards the Mansions of the Almighty, (4) in Perfect Faith, (5) with the gift of salvation in eternal life awaiting us at the end of our puny mortal lives?!
Therefore, it is time we enlighten others especially our ‘casual’ Christian brethren in simple terms that, Jesus is our life and without Him we are as good as dead, for even if we live it is worthless to live as a ‘zombie’ – “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1), which in other words implies that ‘if we are not in Christ, we are condemned – aren’t we?’.
Happiness may depend on happenings but, our Joy definitely comes only from Jesus. Amen.