I've been an artist since I was three, so you can imagine my
excitement when I got my first jumbo box of Crayola® crayons — you
know, the 64 color set with the built-in sharpener. My normally thrifty
parents indulged me in this extravagance to celebrate my entry into first grade.
It was a short-lived happiness, since the girl, who sat next to me, stole them from my desk.
She erased my name from the box and put hers in its place. It was a small loss because
I learned a lesson more valuable than a box of crayons.
There's a universal sense of fairness that exists in all cultures, and
at every age. I was hurt because someone took something that was
rightfully mine. But I was withholding something that belonged to
someone else. I had not recognized God for Who He was and what was
His due.
You see, God cannot tolerate sin. He is so
pure — completely without sin — that He requires each and every person to
spend eternity in Hell as punishment. No amount of clean living or good
deeds could ever change that destiny. The good news is that God is also
so full of love that He made it easy for anyone to escape that endless
existence of agony.
God communicated His plan to us in His Bible. It says "But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." [Ro. 3.28] Two thousand years ago, He sent His only son, Jesus Christ (who was God himself) to Israel to die a torturous death. Jesus sacrificed Himself as a substitute, so we wouldn't have to spend eternity in Hell.
I was seven years old when I realized that I had something that belonged to God. My life had been bought with the blood of His son, Jesus. Failure to recognize His ownership meant I was still destined for Hell. It wasn't enough to know, or even believe that Jesus had died on my behalf. I had to surrender my life to His control as His rightful property: not living my life the way I wanted, but Him living in me and through me.
When I made that choice in July of 1969, my destiny changed forever. Just as Jesus rose from the dead, I'll live again after death. Not only the future changed, but the present as well. Each time I choose to let Him live through me, I have a fullness of life that's hard to describe. When trouble rains on me, I don't have to be beaten down — I can have a calmness to weather life's storms. When I sin, I don't have to be haunted by guilt. I can take it to Christ and deal with it properly. I have escaped the penalty of sin, and I can choose to escape the power of sin; all because I gave God what really belonged to Him — my life.