Wednesday, June 4, 2008

A Relationship with Jesus Christ


“Christianity is not a religion, it's a relationship.” How many times have you heard that? Besides having a dubious perspective on James 1:26-27, this statement is demonstrably incomplete. Every sentient being in the universe has a relationship with every other sentient being in the universe. If nothing else, they have a relationship called “strangers.”

But when someone says some variant of what I quoted above, they mean a human has a relationship with God through the finished work of Christ. Abraham, though he didn't know Jesus by name, had the promise of God concerning his “Seed”, and in believing God, he was called a friend of God. That was their relationship.

But friendship isn't the only relationship people can have with God: “Creation” is an action by a Creator that establishes a relationship between a Creator with some other being.

“But,” you're protesting, “I mean a personal relationship, not an object relationship.” Fair enough. You may not believe it, but the Bible declares that every human, lost or saved, has a relationship with God. You probably agree that saved people have a relationship of love, as child to Father, as slave to Redeemer, as lost to Finder (see Luke 15).

But I'm guessing you don't think about the relationship of the lost to the Father, Son and Spirit. But they have one. The Bible's word for this relationship is "enmity," the relationship between enemies.

The lost are enemies of Jesus Christ. When stated that way, it's a bit of a shock. But it has the benefit of being true.

So how can anyone be saved? People can be saved because God loves his enemies.

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