Eternal Life - Part One

ETERNAL LIFE - Part One

 

Aim to lead the children to Christ as Saviour and Lord. Have you prayed about your class this week? Bring their particular problems to the Lord and expect to see them solved. Children often understand spiritual things better than adults.

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We all know the words "eternal life.” We have heard them for many years, but I wonder if we know what they mean. Just what is eternal, or everlasting life? You know what physical life is - it is the opposite of death. A live dog is a dog that is not dead. But the life we are talking about is not just the life of the body, it is the life of the soul. Many of the people whom you see every day have dead souls. Their bodies are alive, but God says they are really dead, dead in trespasses and sins (Ephesians 2:1); dead while living (1 Timothy 5:6).

But where did this death come from? Surely God did not make Adam and Eve with dead souls? No, that is not correct. Their souls were alive, for Genesis 2:7 says that God made man, and he became a living soul. But Adam sinned, and in the moment that he sinned, he died. God had said, "In the day that thou eatest thereof (of the forbidden fruit) thou shalt surely die.” He did die - not his body, but his soul. When his children were born, they were born with dead souls. You know that kittens have cats for their mothers, and puppies have dogs for their mothers. A puppy could not have a cat for a mother. You know, too, that a piece of wood, or a stone could not turn into a thing that was alive. So Adam, who had a dead soul, could not have a son with a living soul. Everyone, since Adam, excepting the Lord Jesus, has been born with a dead soul.

 

This is why God talks about giving us eternal life. We do not have it to begin with, and we can receive it only as a gift.

 

What is the matter with a dead soul? First of all, it is full of sin. It is not holy, and God cannot touch it. He could never let a soul that was dead in sin come into His holy Heaven. A dead soul cannot understand Gods Word. To people who do not yet have eternal life, the Bible seems foolish. They cannot understand it at all (1 Corinthians 2:14).

 

God saw these needs, and He provided eternal life for us. Jesus died on the cross, so that God could give us this great gift. "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”

 

Still we want to know just what this eternal life is. The Bible says that Christ is the life. Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth and the life" (John 14:6). (Look up and read also John 1:4; 1 John 1:2; 1 John 5:13 and 20.) So if you have the Lord Jesus Christ in your heart, you have eternal life.

 

When Jesus was here He was able to raise the dead (Read the story of Lazarus - John 11 , and Jairus' daughter Luke 8) because He was the life. He is able also to make dead souls alive, because He is the life. (Read John 11:25; 17:3.) When Jesus is our Saviour, we have eternal life, and our souls are no longer dead. Then we are made holy, and we can also understand Gods Word. Philippians 1:21 says that for Paul "to live” was "Christ.” He is the only one who can make any of us spiritually alive, and He does it by saving us. That is one reason why He died.

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STUDY QUESTIONS

• Why do all humans have sin?
• How is eternal life a gift?
• Why was Christ able to give us eternal life?
• What does it mean that Christ is in our hearts?