“For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
-Romans 6:23 (ESV)

April starts out this year with Easter Sunday. A time where Christians celebrate the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. If you are a believer, it is a great time filled with worship, reflection, and hopefully a renewed mind and commitment to Christ. For those that aren’t believers it might be a strange thing to hear about or see, so I wanted to take the time to make sure we understand what Easter is all about. In our verse today we see that the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life. But what does this mean?

When we study the bible we see that God loves us and desire us to be with Him. But sin (or disobedience to God) entered the world when the first two people, Adam and Eve, disobeyed God after doing the one thing God told them not to. And sin spread like wildfire to generation after generation to where everyone has sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, including you and me. And if left to our own, we will spend our life aimlessly searching for something to help in all the wrong places. And because of this we are in need of someone to save us, and that someone is Jesus (God in flesh) who lived a life without sin and died a death he didn’t deserve because of His love for us. But he didn’t stay dead. Three days later he rose from the grave conquering sin and death so that anyone who would believe in Him will be made right with God and get to spend eternity with Him. This is the Gospel, this is the good news, this is what brings us salvation, and this should be what we celebrate each time we study God’s word and think of Him. That God loves us so much that he made a way for us to be with Him, by believing in Jesus and His death, burial, and resurrection.

This is what we celebrate on Easter and each and every day of our lives. That God saves us and through Jesus we can be with God forever. This is a free gift that God offers to anyone. But it is a gift you must accept. Kind of like on Christmas morning, when you look under the tree and find a gift with your name on it; its yours to have. However, if you leave it there and never open it, you don’t get to enjoy the gift. The same if true with Jesus. He is offering you the gift of eternal life, but you have to accept it. And when you do, when you put your trust in Jesus, He forgives you of your sin and makes you right with God so that you can spend eternity with Him.

If you do not have a relationship with Jesus, I would love to talk to you and answer any questions you make have. Jesus is the gift you can ever receive, and I hope that you will accept that gift and put your faith in Jesus today!

Coach Nick