You know, there’s a lot of you could possibly be wondering, why should I follow Jesus? Why should I become a Christian? Why should I believe in Christianity? You’re thinking, well, there’s a lot of religions in the world. There’s a lot of ways to worship. There’s a lot of different concepts of God out there. What makes Christianity something that I should accept, that I should follow, that I should believe it. And I’ll say it like this really? Simply because unlike just about every other religion out there, Christianity is the only one that promises you a relationship with God in your heart while you’re still on this earth. Most other religions, they give you a list of commands. They give you a list of things to do to earn or be rewarded by getting into heaven. Most other religions are based not on a relationship, but on servitude. They think there’s some big God in the sky, and he’s got a list of really harsh demands that if we follow all these our whole life, that one day hopefully we will be pleasing to him, but it never becomes a relationship with those other religions. It’s always seemingly a servitude. You never are elevated to the level of a child of God like Christianity does. You’re never put on the level of being in a family with God. Being in a relationship with God.
They put you in a place of servitude. You’re a servant. Yeah. You could be a good servant. You could even be a pleasing servant to these people’s concept of God. But that’s all you’ll ever be is a servant, and servant is not family. Let’s go back to the Garden of Eden, when God created man. We all pretty much know the story in Genesis chapter one about how God created the heavens and the earth. He put the sun and the stars, the moon in the sky. He created the dry land. He separated the dry land from the oceans. And then he put creatures both into the oceans, into the sky, and of course, on earth. And then he looked at these creatures he had made. He didn’t find any creature that he could have fellowship with. And that’s when he said, let us make man in our image. And who is the us he was referring to? It was God the Father, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit. And he said in our image. Now a lot of people take that to mean, well, he has a head and two arms and two legs and, you know, looks like a person. Well, that could be. But what he really meant is in our spiritual image, in our image as a eternal spirit, in our image, as a spirit that will live forever. And here’s also very important, a being that has a choice to follow him or not.
God could just force people to follow him, twist their arm, and make us. But you know what? We would just be slaves. That that doesn’t give God fellowship, somebody who is forced to serve him. You know, people may say, oh, yes, you’re great God, I will follow you forever. And it doesn’t mean anything if you’re forced to say it. He wanted a people that would choose to follow him voluntarily. Again, because God wanted a family. And that’s what makes our relationship with God so desirable to God. Because we, as having an independent free will, have said, yes, Lord, I want a relationship with you. And that is what makes fellowship so exciting to God and to us. I’ve heard it described as when God made us, He made a God shaped vacuum in our hearts and all the other religions of the world and all the other philosophies, even atheism, nothing out there will fill that God shaped vacuum in your heart because you were created to want and need fellowship with God.