{"id":2064,"date":"2020-07-08T13:36:08","date_gmt":"2020-07-08T18:36:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.stolaffd.com\/?p=2064"},"modified":"2020-07-08T13:36:26","modified_gmt":"2020-07-08T18:36:26","slug":"lifes-greatest-gift","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.stolaffd.com\/?p=2064","title":{"rendered":"LIFE\u2019S GREATEST GIFT"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Everyone loves presents, yet many people reject the greatest gift ever given.\u00a0 This gift is God\u2019s Son, and the term \u201conly begotten\u201d expresses His uniqueness.\u00a0 There has never been anyone else like Jesus, who is truly God and truly human.\u00a0 He is the only One who lived a perfect life and died as a sinless sacrifice in the place of sinful humanity.

When God gave the gift of His Son, mankind had two options.\u00a0 They could either accept Jesus by faith or reject Him.\u00a0 This is the most important choice a person will ever make, because the outcome has eternal ramifications.\u00a0 God will one day judge the people He has created, and that judgment will be on the basis of what they have done with the gift of His Son.\u00a0 Those who believe in the Savior will not be condemned, because they have received eternal life.\u00a0 However, John 3:18 says whoever doesn\u2019t believe has already been judged and condemned for unbelief. \u00a0

The determining factor between the accepters and the rejecters is the object of their love.\u00a0 Those who refuse God\u2019s Son love their sin and don\u2019t want to change.\u00a0 But believers come to Christ because they love the truth and desire righteousness. \u00a0

Please open\u00a0 your bible to the following scripture reading:\u00a0 John 3: 16-21
<\/strong>\u201cFor God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.\u00a0 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.\u00a0 Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God\u2019s one and only Son.\u00a0 This is the verdict:\u00a0 Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil.\u00a0 Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come<\/em> into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed.\u00a0 But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God.\u201d<\/em>

Thoughts from John 3:16-21
<\/strong>God\u2019s love reaches out and draws others in.\u00a0 God sets the pattern for true love, the basis for all love relationships – when you love someone dearly, you are willing to give freely to the point of self-sacrifice.\u00a0 God paid dearly with the life of his Son, the highest price he could pay.\u00a0 Jesus accepted our punishment, paid the price for our sins, and then offered us the new life that he had bought for us.\u00a0 When we share the gospel with others, our love must be like Jesus\u2019- willingly giving up our own comfort and security so that others might join us in receiving God\u2019s love.\u00a0 In eternal life there is no death, sickness, enemy, evil, or sin. \u00a0To \u201cbelieve\u201d is more than intellectual agreement that Jesus is God.\u00a0 It means to put our trust and confidence in him that he alone can save us.\u00a0 It is to put Christ in charge of our present plans and eternal destiny.\u00a0 Believing is both trusting his words as reliable, and relying on him for our desire to obey God and do what is right.\u00a0 We keep praying to live in the light\u00a0 of Jesus rather than darkness. \u00a0

Key thought:<\/strong>
God did not send his Son into the world to judge the world, he sent his Son that through him the world should be saved.\u00a0 Jesus was sent to save, not to condemn.\u00a0 Through the grace of God we receive salvation through faith in Christ.\u00a0 Believe, trust, share His love.\u00a0

Blessings from the Youth Committee

References:\u00a0 God\u2019s Word NIV and In Touch Ministries\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Everyone loves presents, yet many people reject the greatest gift ever given.\u00a0 This gift is God\u2019s Son, and the term \u201conly begotten\u201d expresses His uniqueness.\u00a0 There has never been anyone else like Jesus, who is truly God and truly human.\u00a0 He is the only One who lived a perfect life and died as a sinless […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":402,"featured_media":1878,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2064","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stolaffd.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2064","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stolaffd.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stolaffd.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stolaffd.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/402"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stolaffd.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2064"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.stolaffd.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2064\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2065,"href":"http:\/\/www.stolaffd.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2064\/revisions\/2065"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stolaffd.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1878"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stolaffd.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2064"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stolaffd.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2064"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stolaffd.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2064"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}