The Gospel Coalition

This post is written by my youngest brother, Weston Wax, a senior in high school who is planning on attending Union University in the Fall. Someone asked him why he was a Christian, prompting him to craft this response. Feel free to leave some comments to encourage him.

I was born a sinner (Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, And in sin my mother conceived me. Psalm 51.5), torn apart from oneness with God (All have sinned and fallen short of the Glory of God. Romans 3:23). Because of the mutiny that took place in the Garden, when Man rejected God as creator and tried to supplant His authority with mans, a wall has been set in place between me and God. The sins that I commit (and we all sin) cannot go unpunished. Because God is a just God, He is held to His responsibility of judging my sin, and sentencing me to death. (For the wages of sin is death. Romans 6:23)

However, because of his love for me, God the father gave me a gift, an alternative, a replacement. This gift is the person of Jesus Christ (For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son, that whosoever believes in him, will not die but have eternal life. John 3:16). God deemed it acceptable that the sacrifice of His own Son would be a just replacement for my own life. Only because his son was blameless and without sin would this sacrifice be sufficient. On the cross, Jesus took my sins upon himself, bearing the full brunt of God’s wrath and justice, and tore down the wall that we built, dividing me from God (But the gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Romans 6:23). Jesus stood in my place, and received the punishment that I deserved.

It is this sacrifice that I feel commanded to surrender to. I have been given a second chance, a hope of reunion with God, and that gift is too good to pass up. I feel it’s my responsibility to glorify God (Whether therefore you eat or drink, do all to the glory of God. 1 Cor. 10:31). I couldn’t truly glorify God while still shackled to my old self: but by relying on the sacrifice of Jesus Christ I am made into a new being (and have put on the new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him– Col. 3:10, and put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth. Eph 4:24).

Now, I can approach God’s throne confidently, (But now Christ has brought you back to God by dying in his physical body. He did this so that you could come into God’s presence without sin, fault, or blame.Col. 1:22) knowing that Jesus has taken my punishment and my sins are nailed to the cross where I no longer have to feel their weight. I am able to feel no shame for my past and its stains, because Jesus has cleansed those stains and promised to continue to renew my heart daily. I, under this transformed way of life, am now commanded to live purely and blamelessly (like Jesus, our example).

Because of the sin nature that is still in me, it is inevitable that I will continue to sin. However, by simply asking for forgiveness and turning away from that sin, I am forgiven by God and he remembers my sins no more. (If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness 1 John 1:9)

It is the hope of total redemption that gives me a reason to live and breathe. Nothing outside of Jesus Christ gives me this hope. (I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me John 14:6).

Because of His Sacrifice, which demands my surrender, which gives me freedom, which gives me a hope… I am a Christian.

written by Weston Wax  © 2008 Kingdom People blog