Bible Questions and Answers

According to Christian researcher George Barna (www.barna.org) only 40% of Americans and 62% of Christians believe that Jesus lived a sinless life.  This view among Christians is perhaps the most perplexing of any to me.  If Jesus sinned while on earth, what is the basis for one’s salvation?  Why was Jesus’ death on the cross any more significant than if you or I sacrificed ourselves?  No one is going to heaven by virtue of my sacrifice and if Jesus had sinned while here on earth He would be no different than the rest of us.

When sacrifice was implemented in the Old Testament, the requirement was a perfect sacrifice.  The Jews were expected to present an umblemished sacrifice because it pointed to a perfect savior who would be a sacrifice for them.  The book of Malachi rails against the Israelites for giving worthless sacrifices of crippled and unfit animals.  This was because it was saying that anything was acceptable as a sacrifice despite what God had required.  Unfit animals were not acceptable because they didn’t point to the perfection of Jesus who would die on the cross once and for all for our sins.

Jesus gets lumped in with other religious figures.  He was a good teacher.  He taught people to resist doing wrong and wanted everyone to love one another.  If this is all that Jesus is, then He is no different than Buddha, Confucius, Gandhi, or Martin Luther King.  It is because Jesus was sinless that He was capable of bearing our sins on the cross.  He was the unblemished sacrificial lamb that was slaughtered at the time of Passover.  Nobody but a sinless person could take away our sins.

According to Christian researcher George Barna (www.barna.org) 72% of all Americans and 53% of Christians believe that it might be possible for someone to earn their way into heaven through good deeds.  This doesn’t go so far as to say that these people believe that they are working their way into heaven but that some others might be accepted because of good deeds.

John 14:6 says, “Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

There is one way to heaven and that is through Jesus.  There are no shortcuts or alternative routes.  This belief is likely held out for people who seemed good but never could be bothered by Christianity.  We don’t like the idea that God would punish someone who was “relatively good.”  But the fact remains that pretty good doesn’t meet God’s standard.  We are all sinners and we are all in need of forgiveness, even those who were pretty good and who tried to live a good life.

Once again, we must go back to the idea of absolute standards.  God set the standard at perfection.  If we can make it into heaven by being good, how good is good enough?  How could we ever have assurance of salvation if making it into heaven depended on some other standard that we were never given?  But we were given a standard.  The standard is perfection and we fall short of it.  And because of that we need the forgiveness of Jesus.  Good deeds are not going to be enough.

Good deeds do not address the issue of sin.  We all sin, even the best of us.  But how can a good deed make up for something bad that we have done?  Once hurtful words are out of our mouth, they can’t come back.  Once we have done something wrong, we can’t undo it, only hope to repair the damage from it.  Only forgiveness addresses the issue of sin.  Forgiveness is what is needed to make it to heaven, not good deeds.  There are no good deeds that can make up for the bad things that we do, no matter how many good things we do.

According to Christian researcher George Barna (www.barna.org), only 27% of all adults and 40% of Christians believe that Satan is real.  This means that people don’t take him seriously.  Satan is depicted as a fallen angel in the Bible.  He is depicted as a real force every place that he appears.  He is not simply a symbol of evil, he is the father of lies and is a master deceiver. 

Satan is the one who deceived Eve in the Garden of Eden.  It was he who tempted Jesus in the desert, even twisting scripture in an attempt to get his way.  And it is Satan who will ultimately be thrown into hell when the Day of Judgment arrives.

1 Peter 5:8 tells us this about Satan: Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.  Satan would like nothing more than for us to disregard his existence.

Why does this make a difference whether Satan is real or symbolic?  Everyone is willing to acknowledge that there is evil in the world today.  The difference is whether it is just something that happens because of sinful people, more or less as a fact of life that we will encounter evil, or if it is an organized force.  The fact that Satan is real means that he is working to destroy all those who follow God. 

Every Christian must deal with three forces that cause them to sin – the world, the flesh, and the devil.  The world is full of sinful people who tell us to be like them.  The flesh is our own sinful nature that we battle with, even with the help of the Holy Spirit.  And Satan whispers deceptions in our ear that we can get away with our sin and that it won’t hurt anyone.

Satan is not the only reason that we sin.  It is in our very nature since the fall of Adam and Eve.  But Satan is real and wants us to fail and wants us to turn our backs on God.  He wants us to live life our own way and forget about worshipping our loving Creator.