I
hear this phrase a lot and even say it myself frequently, “Jesus is the
answer.” Now, this a totally true statement, but exactly what does it mean?
Many times, the response is, “What is the question?”
In
the New Testament Jesus and all the writers of the New Testament make the claim
that Jesus is God in the flesh. So, as God, Jesus truly is the answer for
everything we face.
The
New Testament also makes it clear that we are to love Jesus with all that we
are and above any other person, place, or thing.
What
makes Jesus unique, to claim our highest and deepest love? There are so many
reasons that I don’t have enough time or space to mention them all. I want to
mention four.
Matthew
15:19
For
out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality,
theft, false witness, slander.
Number
1: Because of the human condition of sin and evil
Romans
3:10-12 says, “None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no seeks
God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does
good, not even one.”
Romans
3:23 says that all have sinned and fall short of God’s glory.
Romans
6:23 says that the wages of sin is death.
Our
nature is one of being unrighteous, turning away from God, and not desiring to
seek God, and that is sin, and sin always leads us away from God and leads to
death.
The
depravity of humanity is the most empirically verifiable reality but at the
same time the most intellectually resisted fact.
Because
of our sinful nature and condition is why, as God, Jesus is the answer.
Raise
the Roof and Remove the Walls is acknowledging our sinful condition and
realizing that Jesus is the only answer to our human condition.
1
Corinthians 1:18 says, “For the word of the cross is folly to those who are
perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.”
#2:
Jesus’ provision for our sinful human condition
The
provision Jesus gives for you and me is absolutely one of a kind, and it is not
cheap. It is the cross.
Every
other religion or religious world view is about we as humans earning salvation.
In Christianity salvation is from God based on His mercy and grace. When we
choose to accept Jesus’ grace through His death on the cross it changes our
heart and thus our life. The death of Jesus on the cross is the source of our
salvation, the only source.
Raise
the Roof and Remove the Walls is depending on Jesus and Jesus alone for our
salvation.
1
Peter 2:22 says, “He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in His mouth.”
#3:
The purity of Jesus
When
Jesus stood before Pilate and was interrogated, it says that Pilate found no
fault in Him.
The
thief on the cross being crucified with Jesus said that Jesus was being
punished unjustly.
Jesus
was a lamb without blemish. Jesus was unique because He was sinless. So, when
He gave His life on the cross for our sin, He had no sin of His own that He had
to die for.
2
Corinthians 5:21 says, “For our sake He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so
that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.”
Jesus
could die for our sin because He had no sin of His own to die for.
Raise
the Roof and Remove the Walls is acknowledging Jesus’
sinlessness
and that His death on the cross was Him sacrificing Himself for us.
Matthew
28:6 says, “He is not here, He is risen, as he said. Come, see the place where
He lay.”
#4:
Jesus’ resurrection from the dead
Many
people have talked about coming back from the dead, but Jesus said that He
would, and He did.
Jesus’
resurrection gives us victory over sin. Jesus not only died for our sin, but
through His resurrection we are given power to not live our lives in sin and
the enslavement sin brings.
Raise
the Roof and Remove the Walls is believing that Jesus rose from the dead and
living in the victory that His resurrection gives through faith in Him.
Jesus
is the answer because He is the sinless God who came in the flesh and died for
our sin on the cross and rose from the dead.
Jesus as the Only True
God
and Raising the Roof
and Removing the Walls,
Joe
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