Subject 15 : The Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the GALATIANS
[Chapter 2-2] The Essence of Paul’s Faith (Galatians 2:20)
(Galatians 2:20)
“I
have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ
lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith
in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.”
In
today’s Scripture passage, we can find the essence of the Apostle
Paul’s faith: His faith was to believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of
God, that He came to this earth and took upon all the sins of mankind by
being baptized by John, that He carried these sins of the world to the
Cross and shed His blood to death, that He rose from the dead again, and
that He has thereby completed our salvation.
This
is why Paul said, “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I
who live, but Christ lives in me” (Galatians 2:20). Paul stated here
that his old self died with Christ, and that now it is Christ who lives
in him. He continued to say, “The life which I now live in the flesh is
not lived for myself, but for Christ who is in me.”
This
faith is not only the confession of Paul, but also of ours. The Apostle
Paul believed that his sins were passed onto Jesus Christ with the
baptism that He received from John, and it was by this faith that Paul
had died with Jesus and was brought to life again with Jesus. Just as
Paul did by faith, we, too, can die with Jesus Christ and live with Him
as long as we have faith in the gospel of the water and the Spirit.
Through
the gospel of the water and the Spirit, God has saved us from all our
sins once for all. Because Jesus Christ has saved us from the sins of
the world through the gospel of the water and the Spirit, it is by our
faith in Jesus Christ as our Savior that we now live. Therefore,
regardless of how we might look right now in our flesh, in Jesus Christ
we have become those who had died with Him and were brought to life with
Him. We now live a new life by our faith in the Lord who lives forever.
The
Apostle Paul could live such a new life because Jesus Christ had been
baptized and shed His blood for his sins. He said that it wasn’t because
of something good he had done in his flesh, but by his faith in the Son
of God that he lived again. In other words, because the Apostle Paul
believed that by being baptized for him Jesus Christ saved him from the
sins of the world and brought him to life again, by this faith, he had
died with Jesus Christ and was brought to life again with Him. That’s
how he could live his life by faith in the Son of God, and in the
salvation that this Son of God fulfilled by delivering him from his
sins. Such faith is not unique to only Paul, but it is the same for all
those who have received the remission of their sins in Jesus Christ by
believing in the gospel of the water and the Spirit.
Paul’s Faith Was to Believe That He Had Died with Jesus Christ and Was Resurrected with Him
The
reason why the Apostle Paul made this confession is because in his
heart he had faith in the true gospel that he had died with Jesus Christ
and lived with Him: “Because of our sins, we could not avoid but be
accursed forever and face eternal death; however, when Jesus Christ came
to this earth and took upon the sins of mankind once for all by being
baptized by John the Baptist, all our sins were also passed onto Jesus
at that moment, and by being crucified to shed His blood and rising from
the dead again, Jesus has saved us. Therefore, those who now believe in
the gospel of the water and the Spirit can live forever precisely by
faith.”
The
fact that our souls can now live, regardless of whether we are good or
bad in our flesh, is just because of the gospel of the water and the
Spirit. By believing in the Son of God as our Savior who has delivered
us from all our sins, we all can be saved by faith. Moreover, because
the Son of God has at once delivered us from all our sins when we had
been bound by these sins, we are now able to live a righteous life by
placing our faith in the gospel of the water and the Spirit. This is
because the Lord blotted out all our sins once for all with the gospel
of the water and the Spirit, and He has enabled us the believers to live
as God’s workers, thereby making it possible for us to live eternally
blessed lives. Anyone who believes in the gospel of the water and the
Spirit can confess the true faith of salvation from now on.
Since
we still live in our flesh, there are times when we make mistakes.
Sometimes, we are tempted to revert back to the behaviors of our old
selves. If we do not rely on our faith in the true gospel, we might
become dead again by the weight of our accumulated mistakes. The Apostle
Paul was no different; he, too, was capable of going back to his old
self in his flesh, and this is why he could not but rely on the truth
that his old self had been actually crucified with Jesus Christ, and
therefore he could live a new life in Jesus Christ by faith. The Apostle
Paul here was making his confession of faith only properly that Jesus
Christ had brought him to life again through the gospel of the water and
the Spirit. Just like the Apostle Paul’s confession of faith, we, too,
are able to live forever, through our faith of dying with Jesus Christ
and of being brought to life again with Him.
This
is a tremendous faith based precisely on the gospel of the water and
the Spirit. Now, those who have been washed from all their sins by
believing in the gospel of the water and the Spirit are the ones who
have this same faith by which they are living their new lives with Jesus
Christ. Yet among so many people living this world, only a handful of
Christians have the definitive knowledge of the gospel of the water and
the Spirit and believe in it. Whenever I think about this, I am
compelled once again to thank God for my precious salvation. Though we
are insufficient, we can now follow the Lord because of our faith in the
Son of God.
As
we have been carrying on with our lives of faith, we’ve done some good
things, but we’ve also made many mistakes. Yet I see that this is
unavoidable even in the future, in that as we live our lives of faith,
we cannot help but continue to make mistakes. Do you believe that you
are capable of excelling in everything?
Some
people might be worried about how to serve the Lord to the end when
they think about their wickedness and weaknesses even though they have
been born again by believing in the gospel Word of the water and the
Spirit. However, to serve the Lord is not through our own strength, but
we can serve Him through our faith with the power given by the Lord. We
must realize that it is always the Lord who empowers us.
When
we think about ourselves, we are worrying over the days to come because
we do not have faith, the belief that we had died with Jesus Christ and
were brought to life again with Jesus Christ. In addition, the reason
why we come to worry about how we can live in this world is because we
keep looking at our own insufficiencies. Sometime we think to ourselves,
“I really shouldn’t be like this,” and mindful of our many
shortcomings, we worry how we can carry on with our lives of faith. So
we even consider it a miracle that we have come along this far with our
lives of faith. But all such worries can now be vanquished once for all
with our faith that dies with Jesus Christ and lives with Him.
This
kind of faith enables us to follow the Lord everyday by faith. Before
our Lord, we’ve done some good things with our faith, but mistakes have
also been made. Even so, by our faith in the Lord, we still live in
boldness. We will, of course, strive to do things well, but when we
consider our past selves, there clearly were some mistakes made, and so
there will be times when we reach moments of weakness. In times like
these, you need faith all the more, just as the Apostle Paul had lived
by his faith in the gospel of the water and the Spirit.
“I
have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ
lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith
in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me” (Galatians
2:20).
Paul
confessed that it was because of Christ that he had lived a new life
thus far and that he would also live by faith in the Son of God. He said
that because the Son of God took upon all our sins once for all through
the baptism He received for us, and because He was crucified and died
on the Cross, it is by our faith in this that we live. To all of us who
believe in the gospel Truth of the water and the Spirit, the Lord has
given the perfect remission of sin and new life. Because God has saved
us once for all, we, too, have become the ones who live forever by
believing in the baptism that this Son of God received and in His
bloodshed. By this faith, that the Son of God has saved you from all
your sins through the gospel Truth of the water and the Spirit, you can
live forever.
Whenever
our weaknesses are revealed, we have to remember the essence of the
Apostle Paul’s faith. You and I cannot live by looking at our flesh
alone. If we look toward only our own flesh as we live, there can only
be death awaiting us. We can triumph and also receive eternal life by
our faith in the Son of God who has saved us perfectly. Therefore, it is
indispensable for us to realize that our old selves are dead beings in
Jesus Christ, but at the same time, we are the new creatures to live
forever, because the Son of God has saved us, who had all been sinners,
and we believe in Him as our Savior. By our faith in the gospel of the
water and the Spirit given by this Son of God, we have been brought to
life again from death. It is by this faith in the Truth that the Son of
God has saved us, that we are now to live forever.
Right
now in your hearts, there must be the belief that the Son of God has
saved us from all our sins and brought us to eternal life. Do you have
this faith? Do you believe that through the gospel of the water and the
Spirit, Jesus Christ has already blotted out your sins, bore the
condemnation of all sins, and rose from the dead again? It is my sincere
desire that all of you would now believe in the gospel of the water and
the Spirit, and quickly come to have the same faith that Paul had. Our
Lord lacked nothing to blot out your sins through the gospel of the
water and the Spirit, to make you God’s people, and to turn you into the
workers of His righteousness. By believing that God has made us His own
children who are to live forever, we will indeed live forever by this
faith. We believe that our Lord Jesus Christ is the Son of God, and that
He has saved us through the gospel of the water and the Spirit. We are
therefore to live forever with God.
Do
you believe in the Son of God who came by the gospel of the water and
the Spirit as your Savior? You must believe so, that for you, Jesus
Christ the Son of God was baptized by John, died on the Cross, rose from
the dead again, and has thereby saved you from all your sins.
Now
we have come to recognize that we are dead beings in faith. And we have
actually become new living creatures by believing in the gospel of the
water and the Spirit, and therefore we are running toward the finish
line by placing our faith in the Lord. Sometimes, staring at the
weaknesses of our flesh, we would end up falling into a bottomless pit
and wandering in the valley of death. But instead of looking at our own
flesh, we can stand firm again by looking at ourselves through our faith
in the gospel of the water and the Spirit. In fact, we had died with
Jesus Christ in the gospel of the water and the Spirit, and we have been
brought to life again with Jesus Christ.
Our
souls, who now believe in the gospel of the water and the Spirit like
Paul’s faith, have become living spirits. Though we live in our weak
flesh now, we have been able to live a righteous life by faith in the
gospel of the water and the Spirit. This is because there is power in
the gospel of the water and the Spirit. It is because we believe
wholeheartedly in the Lord who came by the water and the blood that we
have been able to live forever. In other words, even though our flesh is
insufficient, we still have eternal life that never dies.
Just
as the Apostle Paul had lived by faith with Jesus Christ, you and I
must also live by faith in the gospel of the water and the Spirit.
Looking at yourselves, if you think, “Why am I like this? I am so
hopeless!” and fall into despair, you are bound to die. But if you
believe that the Son of God has forever blotted out all your sins, and
that He has raised you from death, then you can live with Jesus Christ.
Because Jesus Christ has actually saved you with the Truth of the water
and the Spirit, if you have faith in this gospel, you can die and live
with Him.
The
Lord has definitely saved you and me from death. By delivering you from
all your sins and the condemnation of all your sins, the Lord has made
you God’s own people. He has saved you and me by delivering us from all
our sins and giving us new life. This is the basis of how we can be
resurrected from death to live again, and how we have also received the
blessing of eternal life from God.
We
must always live in the gospel of the water and the Spirit, believing
that we had died with Jesus Christ and were brought to life with Jesus
Christ. And we must live by the faith that believes in the Son of God.
To do so, we should not look at ourselves in despair by what we see, but
always look toward the Lord. In fact, we have been able to live all
this time until now only by the grace and help of the Lord. It is when
we always look toward the Lord by faith that we can do what is right and
never die. When we did not look toward the Lord but followed the
biddings of our own will, we couldn’t avoid but do what the Lord did not
want us to do. Whatever good things you might have done, these were
done because of your faith in the gospel of the water and the Spirit,
and whatever bad things you might have done, these mistakes were made
because you were misled by your thoughts of the flesh.
The
faith of the Apostle Paul is revealed in Galatians 3:27, where he said,
“For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ.”
This confession means that we come to have the faith that enables us to
die with Jesus Christ and to live with Him when we believe that the Lord
has delivered us with the gospel of the water and the Spirit. For us to
truly become one with Jesus Christ, and to die and live with Him, we
must first have this faith that knows and believes in the gospel Truth
of the water and the Spirit given by the Lord. He enables us believers
to die with Christ and to live with Him through this gospel of the water
and the Spirit.
This
is why the Apostle Paul said in Galatians 1:11-12, “But I make known to
you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached by me is not
according to man. For I neither received it from man, nor was I taught
it, but it came through the revelation of Jesus Christ.” It was through
the revelation of Jesus Christ that we also could have been saved from
all our sins, and live as God’s servants as well.
What Has Our Lord Shown to Us Who Believe in the Gospel of the Water and the Spirit?
“The
revelation of Jesus Christ” in the above passage means to open and show
the domain of God to us. Through His revelation, we came to realize how
God has saved us from our sins. The Lord revealed this through the Word
of God. In the Old Testament, sacrificial animals accepted the
Israelites’ sins as they laid their hands on the heads of the animals.
And the animals bled to death before the altar of burnt offering and
were burnt right away to pay off the sins of the Israelites. In the Old
Testament, it was an unblemished lamb, goat, or bull that became the
sacrificial offering before God and at once blotted out all the
iniquities of a sinner.
In
the New Testament, it was Jesus Christ who, like the sacrificial
system’s laying on of hands and sacrifice, accepted the sins of mankind
once for all by being baptized by John the Baptist, shouldered the sins
of this world all at once, died on the Cross, rose from the dead again,
and has thereby become the perfect Savior of believers. Becoming like
the sacrificial offering of the Old Testament, Jesus revealed true
salvation to us, and became the Savior who saved us from all our sins
and destruction. To blot out our sins, the Son of God was baptized and
crucified, and He became the Savior who eradicated all sins and all the
condemnation of sin.
The
Apostle Paul also could become a servant of God by his faith in the
gospel of the water and the Spirit that the Lord had revealed to him. He
believed that Jesus Christ came to this earth to save us from the sins
of this world, and when He turned 30, He took upon the sins of the world
once for all by receiving baptism from John the Baptist. Paul also
believed that because Jesus had taken all the sins of the world, He bore
all the condemnation of sin and died on the Cross, and rose from the
dead again to be our perfect Savior. This was the faith of the Apostle
Paul, and this is our faith. The Apostle Paul’s faith was one that had
died with Jesus Christ and was brought to life with Him. So, he
confessed his faith by saying, “For as many of you as were baptized into
Christ have put on Christ” (Galatians 3:27).
The
revelation that Jesus Christ has shown us as His salvation is none
other than the gospel of the water and the Spirit. The Bible says that
Jesus came to this earth as the Son of God and our own sacrificial
offering, and that He was baptized and shed His blood to save us
perfectly from the sins of the world. Paul’s faith was one that believed
in the gospel of the water and the Spirit. The Apostle Paul believed in
the baptism Jesus Christ received and the blood He shed on the Cross as
the essentials of his salvation. His faith entailed the belief that
when Jesus was baptized, his sins were also passed onto Him. Paul was a
man of faith who believed that when Jesus Christ, having received His
baptism from John the Baptist and accepted the sins of the world, went
to the Cross and was crucified, his sins were also crucified with Jesus.
And he believed that when Jesus Christ rose from the dead again, he
also rose with Jesus Christ by faith. This was the gist of Paul’s
faith.
In
short, the Apostle Paul believed in Jesus Christ as his perfect Savior.
He testified to this true salvation by placing his faith in Jesus
Christ, our Savior. He believed that he had died with Jesus Christ, and
that he was also brought to life with Him. Because Jesus Christ bore the
sins of this world by being baptized by John the Baptist, was
crucified, and rose from the dead again, it is by this faith in the
Truth that we can die and live with Christ. The death and resurrection
of Jesus Christ are our own death and resurrection. The resurrection of
Jesus Christ, in other words, is the resurrection of Paul, and at the
same time it is our resurrection.
Paul
confessed that he had become alive by believing in the Truth that the
Son of God had redeemed him, and that he would live forever by the same
faith. His faith enabled him to die with Jesus Christ and to be
resurrected with Him. With this faith in the gospel of the water and the
Spirit, he could receive the remission of all his sins, become a
servant of God, and become one of God’s own people who would live in His
Kingdom forever.
Now,
we must have the faith that makes us get baptized into Jesus Christ. We
must have the faith that enables us to die with Jesus Christ and to be
brought to life with Jesus Christ. When we have the faith that enables
us to unite with Jesus Christ, we can become the ones who will live
forever with Jesus Christ to never die. The Son of God has delivered us
from sin and death because He has given us the faith to live forever
through His baptism and His bloodshed on the Cross. Our Lord took care
of our insufficiencies, and He has made us to live forever as well.
The
Apostle Paul believed in the gospel of the water and the Spirit and
preached the Truth of salvation to the saints of the Galatian churches,
but their faith was deteriorated soon. So he wrote to them, “I marvel
that you are turning away so soon from Him who called you in the grace
of Christ, to a different gospel, which is not another; but there are
some who trouble you and want to pervert the gospel of Christ”
(Galatians 1:6-7).
In
the days of Paul, there were those who troubled the saints in God’s
Church by insisting on the necessity of physical circumcision besides
the gospel preached by Paul. These circumcisionists emphasized that the
saints should keep the statutes of the Law in the Old Testament, such as
circumcision and the Sabbath day.
In
the present age also, the legalists lead their lives of faith as
follows: They offer prayers of repentance to the Lord, trying to wash
away their sins on their own. Crying out loud, “Lord, forgive me!” they
try to purge their sins through their prayers of repentance. To this
day, countless liars have tried to perfect their faith through such
Christian practices and doctrines as the prayers of repentance and the
doctrine of incremental sanctification, but none has been able to meet
their goals and all have been ultimately forsaken. Because they have
tried to wash away their sins not through the gospel of the water and
the Spirit, but through their own prayers of repentance, they have been
stamped as the ones who practice lawlessness.
During
the Early Church period, the circumcisionists arose and tried to
undermine the gospel of the water and the Spirit that Jesus Christ had
given to His Church. But God’s Church put a stop to their attempt, and
moreover, fulfilled its duty to spread the gospel of the water and the
Spirit.
Jesus
Christ came to fulfill His three offices: Jesus Christ is the King of
kings, the Prophet, and the everlasting High Priest of the Kingdom of
Heaven. Jesus Christ is the Savior who came to this earth with these
three offices and who has delivered all sinners from all their sins once
for all. To save His people from their sins, Jesus Christ came to this
earth in the same image of His people, and through the gospel of the
water and the Spirit, He taught us what our sins are and how our
salvation is fulfilled—He taught all these truths all at once. Jesus
Christ offered His own body before God the Father, and to save us from
the sins of the world, He was baptized by John the Baptist, thereby
accepting all the sins of us mankind, all your and my sins, He died on
the Cross, and He rose from the dead again. This is the gospel of the
water and the Spirit, and it is the very gospel that the Apostle Paul
believed in. The Apostle Paul possessed the very faith that enabled him
to die and live with Jesus Christ.
What Consequences Would Follow If We Were to Pervert the Gospel of the Water and the Spirit That Our Lord Has Given Us?
Jesus
Christ, the King of kings and God Himself, came to this earth
incarnated in the flesh of man to save mankind from sin. He took upon
all their sins by being baptized by John the Baptist at the age of 30.
And He carried the sins of the world to the Cross, was crucified to
death, rose from the dead again, and has thereby given us salvation all
at once. But there were those who tried to pervert what Jesus Christ did
to save you and me from our sins. The first example of them was a group
of circumcisionists of the Early Church age.
Paul,
in rebuking those who sought to pervert the gospel of the water and the
Spirit, said that anyone who tries to spread another gospel other than
the gospel of the water and the Spirit is to be accursed. When we
believe in the gospel of the water and the Spirit, then through this
faith of ours, we wholly become God’s people once for all and receive
new life. But the circumcisionists argued that believers had to be
circumcised to be wholly saved. Their faith was a false one.
Yet
even now, there are certain groups that consider Christianity only as a
religion of self-discipline, claiming that we must discipline our minds
and hearts. Through their doctrine of repentance, they are trying to
pervert the gospel of the water and the Spirit, the gospel through which
the Son of God has blotted out our sins once for all. By being
baptized, our Lord took upon all the sins of mankind, and by being
crucified and shedding His blood, He was condemned for all our sins once
for all. This is how He has brought us, who believe in the gospel of
the water and the Spirit, to life.
It
is by believing in this true gospel of the water and the Spirit that we
have received the remission of our sins once for all, become God’s own
people who are to live forever by faith. If, in spite of this, there is
anyone who does not believe in what Jesus Christ the Son of God has done
to save us perfectly, and instead tries to wash away all his sins
through his own prayers of repentance, then he must be rebuked harshly
as a heretic. The doctrine claiming that people can be sanctified by
offering prayers of repentance is one of the most fallacious Christian
doctrines of today.
In
the Galatian churches, there were those who tried to become God’s
people through circumcision. They assigned the same weight to the
obedience to the statutes of the Law, such as physical circumcision,
Sabbath, and other Jewish festivities, as to their faith in the gospel
of the water and the Spirit. Just as some of these people in Galatia had
preached circumcision instead of the gospel of the water and the Spirit
preached by Paul, now in this age and throughout the whole world,
countless Christians are trying to wash away their sins through their
prayers of repentance, rather than through the gospel of the water and
the Spirit. The Apostle Paul continued to say, “But even if we, or an
angel from heaven, preach any other gospel to you than what we have
preached to you, let him be accursed” (Galatians 1:8). But, most
Christians still believe in their prayers of repentance or the doctrine
of incremental sanctification, and they still believe in another gospel
other than the gospel of the water and the Spirit.
One
may then ask, “Then, what is the difference between believing in the
gospel of the water and the Spirit, and trying to be washed from sin by
believing only in the blood of the Cross and offering the prayers of
repentance?” Paul’s faith was one that believed in the baptism Jesus
received from John and His bloodshed on the Cross as his salvation. By
believing in the gospel of the water and the Spirit, we also had truly
died with Jesus Christ, and now live a new life with Him (Romans 6:4).
This faith in the gospel of the water and the Spirit, and the belief
that one can wash his sins everyday through his prayers of repentance,
are different from each other. So, the latter is called “the other
gospel.”
The
Apostle Paul said, “If anyone preaches any other gospel to you than
what you have received, let him be accursed” (Galatians 1:9). For
Christians, the worst abuse that can be uttered to them in this entire
world is, “Damn you.” What other abuse could possibly be worse than to
curse one to be damned by God and go to hell? When Paul said this
passage, he said it to those who then claimed that people could become
God’s own people if they were circumcised. This passage can also be
applied to those who now claim that they can wash away their sins
through their prayers of repentance. Before God, in other words, there
is no other gospel but the gospel of the water and the Spirit. The true
gospel that the Bible speaks of is the gospel of the water and the
Spirit.
What,
then, is the other gospel? Today, it is the false teaching that one can
be washed from his sins by offering prayers of repentance. And in the
days of the Early Church, it was the faith that insisted on physical
circumcision. However, the only true gospel is that to save us from the
sins of this world, Jesus Christ bore these sins once for all by being
baptized by John the Baptist, went to the Cross, shed His blood and died
on it, rose from the dead again, and has thereby completed our
salvation.’
Yet
most Christians throughout the whole world are now placing their faith
in their own prayers of repentance, which is different from the gospel
of the water and the Spirit. So when we preach the gospel of the water
and the Spirit to them, it may seem as if they would be saved at once,
but this is not actually the case. They have been misled by such a false
doctrine so much that their hearts have hardened and they are
unaccustomed to the true gospel. We see that they are unintentionally
standing against the gospel of the water and the Spirit.
However,
as it is written in the Bible, the poor in spirit are blessed
abundantly through this true gospel. After coming across the gospel of
the water and the Spirit, many throughout the whole world, even pastors,
have sent us the following confession of salvation, testifying, “I had
believed in Jesus as a sinner for dozens of years, but I was just born
again and resolved all my spiritual problems by this one book.” They are
sending us their testimonies, saying that they had tried to be washed
from their sins through their prayers of repentance to no avail so far,
but now, by believing in the gospel Truth of the water and the Spirit,
they have truly become new.
What
happens when one believes only in the prayers of repentance? Such faith
will eventually lead him to have empty faith drowning in the flood of
sins. Such people are akin to those who create gods out of their own
thoughts and worship their idol gods of their own making. They think
that they have been saved from their sins, and they believe firmly on
their own that they have become God’s people. They think to themselves,
“Jesus, You are my God,” but they believe without realizing the Truth
themselves. However, all their faith is completely futile, like a castle
built on sand, for their faith is built utterly on their own thoughts
and not on the Word of God. They don’t rely on the Truth that says the
baptism of Jesus and His blood on the Cross have made them whole, and
are instead relying on their own prayers of repentance. Even as they
profess to believe in the ministry of Jesus who shed His blood on the
Cross, they are excluding His baptism that was essential to fulfill the
righteousness of God.
Could
Jesus really have borne the sins of this world without the baptism that
He received from John? Did Jesus blot out our sins just by dying on the
Cross? Clearly, Jesus took upon our sins all at once by being baptized
by John the Baptist, went to the Cross and was crucified, washed away
the sins of the mankind once for all, and has thereby saved all His
believers. How could Jesus take upon our sins on the Cross? It was when
Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist that He took upon the sins of the
world. To believe that one can wash away his sins through his prayers
of repentance is a useless belief of one’s own making.
Even
now, we see that those who believe in their prayers of repentance, not
in the gospel of the water and the Spirit, are still praying and
praising God. However, these people who believe only in their prayers of
repentances are characterized by the fact that their lives of faith are
clamorous, for there is still sin in their hearts, and they are only
too busy to front their own righteousness. Regardless of whether there
are still sins in their hearts or not, they praise God, overwhelmed by
their own beautiful voices that stem from their own emotions. They don’t
care whether God actually desires to hear from them or not.
However,
what we need to realize here is that Jesus Christ has perfectly
delivered us from the sins of the world through the gospel of the water
and the Spirit. There is no sin remaining in our hearts owing to His
righteous acts. It is only when we praise God with a clear understanding
of the gospel of the water and the Spirit that our praise is made
genuine before God. It is because we believe in the gospel of the water
and the Spirit that we are grateful for the Lord’s salvation, and it is
because this inspiration fills us that we come to glorify God. But,
those who believe that they have been washed from their sins through
their prayers of repentance have to adjust their emotions on their own
by telling themselves ceaselessly, “I belong to God’s people. I am one
of the chosen people of God.”
However,
the praise of the righteous is given by faith. Missing a note is not a
concern for us when it comes to praising God. For anyone who
wholeheartedly believes in the God-given gospel of the water and the
Spirit, the gospel of the remission of sin, it is with all his heart
that he praises God. The righteous are rejoiced to praise God with their
hearts of faith. Therefore, you should recognize that if any Christian
believes in another gospel other than the gospel of the water and the
Spirit, then his faith is a superstitious one. To believe in the Truth,
that the Lord has saved us by blotting out our sins through the gospel
of the water and the Spirit, is true faith.
Let
me expand on this point by drawing an analogy to the religions of the
world. Buddhism is one such religion of the world. Buddhists bow to the
stone statues of Buddha asking for blessings. Some others carve out
images out of trees, and then bow before them and beg for blessings.
When Buddhists bow supplicating for blessings, they open and put out
their palms, as if they are asking for something.
But
these stone statues of Buddha are made in the image of man carved out
of rocks by a stonemason. People then take them as their god and worship
them. And they pray to the statues to bless them. Those who are
childless ask for a son. These people think that if they pray sincerely
to what they themselves have carved out of stones, the statues would
somehow help them. None other than this is a superstitious belief. To
believe in the religions of the world is nothing more than believing in
one’s own thoughts.
In
contrast, the Apostle Paul stated clearly that the gospel that he
believed in was of the revelation that Jesus Christ had shown to him.
Paul was spiritually awakened by the Word of the Old Testament, and He
came to believe in this gospel Truth. To know and believe in what God
said in the Old Testament about the remission of sin, and how in the New
Testament Jesus Christ came to this earth, took upon our sins through
His baptism, died on the Cross, rose from the dead again, and has
thereby saved us from all our sins—this is the true faith. The
ministries of salvation that Jesus Christ had carried on when He came to
this earth are none other than the ministries of the gospel of the
water and the Spirit. We were able to be remitted from all our sins,
receive eternal life, and become God’s own people by believing in this
gospel of the water and the Spirit manifested in the Word of God.
Paul
said that by believing in the gospel of the water and the Spirit, he
became a living man, not a dead man, and one who preached this true
gospel. This is why the Apostle Paul rebuked the circumcisionists to be
accursed, saying, “But even if we, or an angel from heaven, preach any
other gospel to you than what we have preached to you, let him be
accursed” (Galatians 1:8). Therefore, we need to find out what these
other gospels other than the gospel are.
To
find out the other gospels, we must first identify the biblically true
gospel that Paul had believed in and preached. The Apostle Paul believed
that the Son of God had blotted out the sins of the world by coming to
this earth and being baptized, dying on the Cross and rising from the
dead again. This is how Jesus has saved us from all ours sins, from all
the condemnation of sin. This is none other than Paul’s faith. Paul’s
faith was placed not only in the blood of the Cross, but it was placed
in both the baptism of Jesus and His blood on the Cross.
Then,
what is the other gospel that is different from the true one that Paul
believed in? It is the gospel of only the blood. People who have faith
in this gospel of only the blood also rely on the prayers of repentance
to wash away their sins. We the born-again believe in the gospel of the
water and the Spirit, but most Christians today believe only in the
blood of the Cross while relying on the prayers of repentance. These two
faiths are far different from each other. The gospel of the water and
the Spirit that we believe is the same gospel preached by the Apostle
Paul. Therefore, God approves our faith in the gospel of the water and
the Spirit. In contrast, for those who try to wash away their sins
through their prayers of repentance, their faith is different from the
gospel of the water and the Spirit, and so I can say confidently that
they will not be approved by God but be accursed instead.
I
am not saying that you don’t need to believe that Jesus shed His
precious blood on the Cross. I am pointing out that for you to believe
only in the blood of the Cross while leaving out the baptism He received
from John is to believe in the other gospel. As long as you hold fast
to the different gospel, you cannot but place your faith only in the
prayers of repentance eventually, because your sins still remain intact
no matter how ardently you place your faith in such a different gospel.
Could
you receive the true remission of your sins by believing only in Jesus’
bloodshed on the Cross and by offering your prayers of repentance? Such
beliefs are no more than superstitious beliefs. This kind of faith only
means that we somehow agree to believe in Jesus as our Savior, and it
is not placing our faith in the God-given gospel of the water and the
Spirit. It is to believe in Jesus merely out of our own thoughts in
simple gratefulness, since He shed His precious blood on the Cross for
us, and to believe that the sins we commit afterwards can be washed away
by ourselves through our own prayers of repentance. Such beliefs are,
in other words, completely of one’s own making. “Jesus, I have decided
to regard You as my Savior.” It is because people believe in Jesus like
this that their sins are not perfectly removed from their hearts. How
could their sins be blotted out just because they profess to believe in
Jesus, without knowing how their sins were passed onto Jesus through His
baptism?
The
Apostle Paul’s faith is also described in Romans 6. It is written in
Romans 6:3-4, “Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized
into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? Therefore we were buried
with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised
from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in
newness of life.”
The
Apostle Paul asked here, “Do you not know that as many of us as were
baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death?” He said that
we were buried with Jesus through baptism into His death. Jesus Christ
came to this earth, took upon our sins by being baptized from John, and
was crucified to death for us. And He then rose from the dead again.
Paul had the faith that Jesus has saved you and me from all our sins.
Jesus
Christ the Lamb of God came to this earth as the propitiation of all
mankind according to the sacrificial system of the Old Testament. He has
saved sinners from their iniquities by taking upon all the sins of His
people through the baptism He received from John, and by shedding His
blood on the Cross. All these righteous acts coincide exactly with the
process of the sin offering of the Old Testament. As the sacrificial
Lamb of God, our Lord bore the sins of the world by being baptized by
John the Baptist. When we turn our eyes to Matthew 3:13 and on, we see
how Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist and thereby took upon the
sins of mankind once for all. In other words, it was after Jesus was
baptized by John that He was crucified to shed His blood on the Cross
and rose from the dead again, and this is how He has saved us at once
from all our sins (Matthew 3:13-17; John 1:29; John 19:30).
We
are now preaching the gospel of the water and the Spirit throughout the
whole world, and Paul in his days was also preaching the same gospel.
This gospel of the water and the Spirit preached by Paul is the same
gospel that we are now preaching. Therefore, if anyone does not believe
in the gospel of the water and the Spirit and therefore does not preach
it, he will be accursed by God.
Churches
all over the world are now about to close their doors, for their
congregations do not believe in the gospel of the water and the Spirit.
Since Christians today believe only in the blood of the Cross and are
trying to wash away their sins through their own prayers of repentance,
their sins ultimately do not disappear, and since their sins are not
blotted out, who would continue to believe in God? This is why every
church has no choice but to close the door of salvation.
Practically
all Christians throughout the entire world believe that they have
received the remission of their sins even as they believe only in the
precious blood of the Cross. But, they are dying away spiritually, for
they cannot but rely on their own prayers of repentance in vain. Just
take a look at the Christians around you who sing praises filled with
only their own emotion. They cannot but praise like this because they
actually do not know and believe how Jesus Christ has saved them through
the gospel of the water and the Spirit. In contrast, for the born-again
who truly believe in the gospel of the water and the Spirit, praises
come only naturally without forcing their emotion, for they are thankful
from the depth of their hearts for the grace of salvation that the Lord
has bestowed on them.
The
Apostle Paul said that anyone who preaches any gospel other than the
true gospel preached by him would be accursed (Galatians 1:8). Paul
asked, “For do I now persuade men, or God? Or do I seek to please men?”
And then he continued to say, “For if I still pleased men, I would not
be a bondservant of Christ” (Galatians 1:10). Because Jesus Christ came
to this earth, was baptized, died on the Cross, rose from the dead
again, and has thereby saved us from all our sins, the Apostle Paul
could not help but believe in the Truth accordingly and preach it
accordingly. Had Paul sought to please men, he would have preached only
the blood of the Cross, but because He was a bondservant of Christ, he
preached the gospel of the water and the Spirit. The Apostle Paul was
never a bondservant of men.
Paul
continued to say in Galatians 1:11-12, “But I make known to you,
brethren, that the gospel which was preached by me is not according to
man. For I neither received it from man, nor was I taught it, but it
came through the revelation of Jesus Christ.”
What
kind of gospel was the gospel that the Apostle Paul believed and
preached to people? Here, “the gospel which was preached by me [Paul]”
means the gospel of the water and the Spirit. He said that this gospel
was neither taught to him by man, nor received from man, but it came
through the revelation of Jesus Christ. He said that God the Father
showed him the gospel Truth of the water and the Spirit through Jesus.
Paul believed in his heart that Jesus Christ saved him from all his sins
through the water and the Spirit.
We
also believe in the gospel of the water and the Spirit. This is why we
are now preaching this gospel of the water and the Spirit to the
truth-seeking Christians scattered throughout the whole world. It
frustrates me greatly when I see the faith of the majority of Christians
in the world. They don’t even realize that they are spiritually
blinded, because they have misbelieved for such a long time.
In
the Early Church period, the Apostles had preached the gospel of the
water and the Spirit. Peter also said, “There is also an antitype which
now saves us—baptism (not the removal of the filth of the flesh, but the
answer of a good conscience toward God), through the resurrection of
Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 3:21). All of us have the same faith that the
Apostle Peter had. Because Jesus took upon the sins of mankind including
your sins once for all by being baptized by John, died on the Cross,
and rose from the dead again, we can be saved from all our sins by
believing in this.
But
what do the majority of Christians throughout the world believe now?
They believe only in the precious blood of Jesus on the Cross. Of
course, the blood He shed on the Cross is enormously precious for our
salvation. But it is of no use if we do not believe in the baptism He
received from John the Baptist. It is because Jesus was baptized by John
and shed His blood on the Cross that our sins could be passed onto
Jesus and be remitted away, and yet today’s Christians do not know this
baptism of Jesus, and therefore they cannot be washed of all their
sins.
For
the lawful atonement, sacrificial animals infallibly had to receive the
laying on of hands from sinners and thereby accept their sins. All
sacrifices had to be put to death, after passing over the sins of
sinners through the laying on of their hands. Like this, Jesus Christ
accepted everyone’s sins by being baptized by John and shed His blood on
the Cross and died at once, but most Christians do not know this nor
believe in it. Even now, they must realize that the Early Church
Christians believed in and preached the true gospel of the water and the
Spirit, and they must believe so.
When
Rome was ruling supreme over the whole western world, Constantine the
Roman emperor proclaimed the Edict of Milan to establish Christianity as
the state religion. It was from then on that the gospel of the water
and the Spirit was perverted. The real truth of salvation is the gospel
of the water and the blood, but the people of that era took out one of
the two essentials from the true gospel. Put differently, they started
to take out the baptism of Jesus from their gospel, and as a result,
they came to believe in the other gospel. Eventually, Christianity,
which had once exerted so much authority as the state religion of Rome,
has now become powerless today.
We
believe in and preach the gospel of the water and the Spirit, which is
the same one that was believed in the apostolic age. Due to our
literature ministry, many people throughout the world, including
theologians and pastors, are now returning to the gospel of the water
and the Spirit. Those who study theology deep enough and in objective
perspectives are apt to admit that the gospel of the water and the
Spirit is the real Truth.
But,
those who know only their own denomination are so stubborn that they do
not even want to know the gospel Truth of the water and the Spirit.
They are holding onto the blood of the Cross alone, as if their
denominational doctrines are the same as the Word of God. Some
denominations claim that one can receive the Holy Spirit if he prays
like a fanatic, shouting out the name of the Lord. What a foolish life
of faith is this? Trapped in their own thoughts and obstinacy, they have
ended up with irrational, superstitious faith. Such is the faith of a
big frog in a small pond.
The
gospel that the Apostle Paul believed and preached was the gospel of
the water and the Spirit. This gospel of the water and the Spirit was
neither received from men, nor was it learnt from men. He learned this
true gospel from God through His revelation. The Apostle Paul’s faith
was not a dogmatic faith that today’s Christians have. From which
denomination did you learn your gospel? Any other gospel that is
different from the gospel of the water and the Spirit is a false
gospel.
The
Apostle Paul was an expert in the Old Testament. Even before he met
Jesus, from the Old Testament he knew all about the Truth, that the
Messiah would take upon and blot out the sins of the world through the
method of laying on of hands. Paul’s mistake, however, was that he did
not realize that Jesus was the very Son of God. This is why at first he
had persecuted Jesus’ disciples. Once Paul went to Damascus with his
subordinates to kill the disciples of Jesus there. At that time, Paul’s
name was Saul. On his way to the city, he encountered the living Jesus
Christ.
Jesus
appeared before Paul in a flashing light brighter than the sun, saying,
“Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me? It is hard for you to kick
against the goads.”
So Paul said, “Who are You, Lord?”
And
the Lord said, “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. But rise and
stand on your feet; for I have appeared to you for this purpose, to make
you a minister and a witness both of the things which you have seen and
of the things which I will yet reveal to you.”
Jesus
Christ shed a bright light and let His voice be heard, and although the
men who journeyed with Paul saw no one, Jesus Christ appeared only
before his eyes and ears. When Jesus Christ appeared before Paul, the
light was so strong that his eyes were blinded, and soon Paul
recognized, “I made a mistake.” “Jesus, in whom these people believe,
truly is the Messiah to come, who was prophesied in the Old Testament!”
Then, Paul came to realize that Jesus was indeed the Son of God, and the
Savior who truly took upon the sins of mankind by being baptized and
blotted them out by dying on the Cross and rising from the dead again.
“The Messiah has already come. He has already saved me through His
baptism and His blood on the Cross!” It is because he realized and
recognized this that he later became a disciple of Jesus Christ and one
of His Apostles.
As
such, the gospel preached by the Apostle Paul is the gospel of the
water and the Spirit, which enables us to die and live with Christ. We
have the faith that enables us to be baptized into Jesus Christ, to die
with Him, and to be resurrected with Him. You must realize that the
gospel that has brought us new life is the gospel of the water and the
Spirit, and that this gospel is the very gospel that the Apostle Paul
preached in the apostolic age.
The
gospel of the water and the Spirit may seem new to you, but it is the
very gospel already manifested and written in the Bible. It is different
from the gospel of only the blood. The Bible approves only the gospel
of the water and the Spirit as the true gospel. This true gospel is now
being testified from mouth to mouth throughout the whole world. In
contrast, the gospel that consists of only the blood of the Cross can
find only half the evidence of salvation from the Bible. No matter how
hard we may search in the Bible, there is no evidence that Jesus took
upon our sins on the Cross; far from it, the Bible testifies that our
sins were passed onto Jesus Christ when He was baptized by John the
Baptist (Matthew 3:13-17).
Would
you believe in Jesus Christ as if you were practicing a religion of the
world? Or would you be saved from your sins by believing in the gospel
of the water and the Spirit given by Jesus Christ and live your lives of
faith by trusting in this gospel? Shouldn’t you believe in what Christ
has done for you? Everyone in this whole wide world must believe in the
gospel of the water and the Spirit now. You must realize that the gospel
of the water and the Spirit is the Truth, and you must also believe in
it as it is.
Recently,
we translated and published a book entitled The Faith of the Apostles’
Creed. To let everyone know how we think of and believe in Jesus Christ,
we are publishing books like this and sending them out to the whole
world. I am sure this book will do great works of God all over the world
because our faith in the true gospel is all contained in the book. In
this book, we are testifying our faith just as it is, how we believe in
the Son of God, who we believe He is, and how He has blotted out our
sins. If people would just read a single book of our Christian book
series, they would all realize how and what we believe.
Today,
most Christians, who make their confession of faith claiming that they
have received the remission of their sins by believing only in the blood
of the Cross, are still living as sinners everyday. But the born-again
who believe in the gospel of the water and the Spirit have no sin. They
are righteous everyday and forever. Though we are insufficient, everyday
we live our lives not as the dead, but as the born-again in Christ.
Because Jesus Christ has brought us new life, as the immortals who have
the faith of everlasting life, we can follow the Lord, and we can enjoy
splendor and glory not just in this world, but also in the next world to
come. God has given you and me such faith.
I give thanks to God for giving me the gospel of the water and the Spirit.
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