All have sinned.
Romans 3:23 - For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.
In the beginning God created everything, and it was good. There was life & beauty. Everything was in perfect order for us to flourish and walk with God. But then humanity sinned. Adam & Eve disobeyed the one rule that God gave them. Instead of trusting God, they decided to do things their way. From that moment on, everything changed. When sin entered the world, God’s creation was broken. With mankind deciding for themselves how to live, everything began to fall apart. We see the effects of this every day. The world is filled with hatred, evil, deceit, and death. It is evident that something is not right. The harder truth to believe is that ALL of us have participated in this. Many people believe that they are good people. But truth is that ALL of us are sinners. The brokenness in the world is not because of people out there, it’s because of the sinful hearts in each of us. Because of sin, we are not right with God.
Sin brings death.
Romans 6:23 - For the wages of sin is death, but the gracious gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
When you work a job, you earn a check. That payment is what you deserve. When we sin, the thing we earn, or deserve, is death. When our lives end, because of sin, we all deserve to be separated from God for all eternity. God is so great and holy that we cannot live in union with God. The only just punishment for sin is eternal separation from Him. Not only does sin separate us from God. Sin destroys who God created us to be. Sin at it's core is destructive. It looks enticing, like bait on a fish hook, but once we’re hooked, the only place is leads is death & destruction. While we all have this problem of sin, there is good news! The Bible also tells us that the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus. God himself made a way to deal with the problem of sin.
Christ died for us.
Romans 5:8 - But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
God loved his creation so much that he chose to show us mercy, and sent his son Jesus to come die in our place so that we could be forgiven. In order for us be made right with God, we need a savior. We need a substitute who could live a perfect, sinless life and then die in our place. This is precisely what Jesus came to do. Jesus, the Son of God, put on flesh and lived among us. He lived without sin. And then he took our punishment by dying on the cross. But he didn’t stay dead. After 3 days in the grave, Jesus rose from the dead, proving to all that he is God and that he had conquered sin and death forever! And the amazing part is that he did it while we were STILL sinners, meaning that we don't have to try to clean ourselves up in order to earn salvation. In fact, there is absolutely nothing we can do in our own power to earn salvation. No amount of church attendance or good deeds can erase our sin. Only the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross is sufficient to put us in right standing with God. This is the gift of God. Now, how must we respond?
Confess and believe.
Romans 10:9-10 - If you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, leading to righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, leading to salvation.
The Bible tells us that the way we receive this free gift of salvation is through faith in Jesus: If you believe in Jesus, believe who he says he is, believe that he died for you and rose again, then you will be justified before God. But it is more than just a belief in our minds. We must also confess that He is Lord. We must make Jesus the Lord of our lives, meaning that we commit to follow Him and not your own way. Through this belief and confession, then you will be saved, meaning that you are forgiven of your past and made new in Christ. The Bible tells us that anyone who is in Christ is a new creation. Their former self is gone, and they are new in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:17).