Romans 5:16-21

My hope and prayer for you is that you grow closer to God in every way, every day. Stay with me in the book of Romans!!!



Romans 5:16-21 (NIV)
16 Again, the gift of God is not like the result of the one man's sin: The judgment followed one sin and brought condemnation, but the gift followed many trespasses and brought justification.
17 For if, by the trespass of the one man, death reigned through that one man, how much more will those who receive God's abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ.
18 Consequently, just as the result of one trespass was condemnation for all men, so also the result of one act of righteousness was justification that brings life for all men.
19 For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous.
20 The law was added so that the trespass might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more,
21 so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

How does a person get to heaven? Sunday after the 11:00 o'clock service I had an appointment with a man that had said to me in our previous meeting, "I guess the best way to describe my life is I am lost." This man has no religious background and yet said those words. In my meeting with him I asked him to let me explain how to get to heaven according to the Word of God. I used John 3:16 as the sole basis of our conversation as I have done for years. The gospel is contained in that one verse. He had not had a drink for at least four days because it was his turn to take the children and his body literally shook the whole hour that we met. His mind, however, was not shaking and he got the message that Jesus saves and that he needs Christ. Pray that he will soon surrender his life. One thing that I shared with him that seemed to help is that faith has three components and they are knowledge, understanding and the will. A person needs some knowledge of what they are to believe in, it is not perfect knowledge. The next step they have to have some grasp of what the knowledge implies for their life. The next step then is to submit to the new truth that is surrender their will. He looked at me when I got to the will part and said "that's it isn't it?" His problem, as with most, is he did not want to submit to God. Do you have a 'will' problem?