There is no doubt that we are living at the time of the end of this wicked generation. Presently everything God gave us for free is been commercialized. For example, people are been made to pay for their salvation with money and with work.
You may be hearing some men of God are telling their congregants the following statements: You need to pay your tithes before you can make heaven. Your tithes and offering is your passport to heaven. You are not entitled to God blessing if you fail to pay your tithes. Or the more you give your time and money to God, the more God will bless you in return. If that is true, it means that it is only those who can pay their tithes and offering will qualify for heavenly hope. What does Bible truth say about everlasting life in heaven or on earth?
Apostle Paul letter to the Galatians Congregation show that a man is not justified by works of the law, but by the faith in Jesus Christ, for by the works of the law shall no man be justified. These statements reflect the fact that the believers are no longer under the yoke of Mosaic laws to compulsorily paying tithe and making sacrifices. Otherwise, Jesus sacrificial dead will amount to nothing if we have to pay and work for eternal life. God forbid (Galatians 2:16)
Everlasting life is a free gift. For example, if I give you a gift and at the same time I demanded some monetary condition to receiving that gift, would you consider it a gift? The answer is no. Gift has no condition attached to it. Similarly, Jesus sacrificial death paid for our sins and dead, making everlasting life in heavens and on earth a free gift. Faith in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ is the only requirement for anyone to have eternal life. Because we are living in the grace dispensation, from the Man creation in the Garden in Eden to the time of Joseph, there were no organized religion but people had direct relationship with God. However, during the second dispensation God selected the Abraham descendants, the Jews as a people for special possession. Moses organized the first religion with Ten Commandments. However, these laws reveal that no man is capable of obeying the laws to the letters. Failure is one law nullified all others laws. No wonder no one can be justified by keeping the laws. Prophet Isaiah put it in clear term when he said, ” We are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousness, are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away”(Isaiah 64:6) Jesus came to our rescue in the third dispensation with grace of everlasting life when he paid with his perfect human life.
The grace dispensation that Jesus mediated grantees everyone who has faith in the ransom sacrifice of Jesus to be safe. To avoid any doubt Paul wrote to the churches: that in the ages to come, He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.(Ephesians 2:7-9)
Even though everlasting life is a free gift we need to excise our faith in Jesus by obeying Jesus to give our time and resources to the poor voluntarily( Luke 6:38). The Bible says those who give to the poor are lending to God. However those who become rich at the expense of poor and those who give to the rich will come to be in want (Proverb 22:16)
Everlasting life was based on grace and undeserved kindness of God. It was not based on money or work so that no one could boast.
Jun 012018