JillStrif

“I was guilty of idolitry-creating a false god to suit my needs. I just sort of made up what “Jesus” wanted and didn’t want, liked and didn’t like. To this day I have heated debates with my dad about Catholicism and Christianity and we absolutely do not agree on many things. However, I am encouraging him to read the Bible and by doing that he is slowly started to come to Christianity. I also show him a lot of videos by Ravi Zacharias, etc. Things that once you actually start to research the truth and indisputable. The important thing is that we need to realize we’re sinners. We are NOT worthy. Our best works are like filthy rags to God (Isaiah 64:6). Why is that? Because of how good GOD is. God is the holiest of holy. The most perfect thing. His standard of good is SO high because He is the standard of good. THAT is why, compared to Him, we fall SO short. Candace Cameron Bure says in her testimony (you can find it on youtube, she’s said it a bunch of times) that when she was a lukewarm Christian she thought of herself as a good person. She wasn’t going out and drinking, smoking, etc. She didn’t do drugs. She had a job and made her own money. She was a “good” person. She says that if the worst thing she was doing was being intimate with her boyfriend, that’s just not bad compared to how bad people round her were by doing drugs, etc. Then she read The Way of The Master by Ray Comfort (you can find his street witnessing videos on youtube) and realized the actual Gospel for the first time. She compares it to this: Say a sheep is eating grass. The sheep looks pretty clean next to the dirt and the grass, right? It looks very white. Then it starts snowing and the grass is covered with perfectly white snow. How does the sheep look? Dirty! It doesn’t look white at all. That’s because when we hold ourselves to the standard of the world, it’s REALLY easy to come up clean. All we have to do is stand next to a murderer and without even doing anything we look good. But when we stand before God’s standard-the white snow-we come up dirty and are shown for what we really are. We have broken all the commandments. If you’ve ever lied before, you’re a liar. If you’ve ever stolen before, you’re a thief. If you’ve ever lusted, you’re an adulterer. If you’ve ever hated someone you’re a murderer. So far you’re a lying, thieving, murdering adulterer, and those are just some of the Commandments. You may think “but I did that in the past! I’m different now!” How would that fly in the courtroom? EVERYTHING is in the past. Someone rapes someone. It was in the past! So what, he still needs to be punished, no? We are guilty and we deserve Hell. But God literally came to this Earth-fully God and fully man-to take our punishment so we could go to Heaven. If we’re in a courtroom and God is the judge, we know we’re guilty like I said before. We cannot pay the fine and become worthy of Heaven on our own so we are destined to God’s prison, Hell. Then someone walks into the courtroom and gives God a check with YOUR name on it. That person was Jesus. God says you’re free to go because JESUS paid your fine. He can legally dismiss your case. Once you accept Jesus as your savior by realizing you NEED Him then God wipes your slate clean. You can be in Heaven not because of what you did or didn’t do but all because of what God did for you. 

Most people don’t know that. They know Jesus died for our sins but they don’t actually understand it. I know I didn’t until I heard Ray Comfort explain it.”