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God's Family Plan

In the beginning God created mankind so that He could have children. [1].  Like any loving father, he gave mankind free will, permission to choose to obey or disobey Him.  He gave this free will to mankind because He wanted children, not robots.  God is love [2] and he wants to be loved by His children for who He is, not because He makes them love Him.

God knows everything.  From the beginning he knows the ending [3].  Before God made mankind, He knew that mankind would use their free will to disobey Him.  Because God is just, He knew that rebellion would have to be punished.  He knew that He would lose His children to rebellion and disobedience.  So God developed a plan, a family plan.  He would provide a way that would satisfy the need for justice and punishment while also showing His mercy to mankind.  If any man or woman became aware of this reconcilliation plan and adhered to the requirements of the plan, they would become the child of God and God would be their loving Father.  Anyone that does not meet the requirements of the plan is to be separated from God the Father forever.

 God's family plan is very simple and very easy.  It is based upon what a person believes.  A person cannot work his way into the family of God.  He cannot be good enough, kind enough, or diligent enough to deserve being adopted into the family of God.  A person cannot pray or worship his way into God's family.

As expected, soon after God created mankind His children used their free will to rebel against Him.  This rebellion caused the separation that God had known would occur.  God still loved mankind [4] [5]  so He put his family plan into operation so that He could have his children again.  His plan begins with a man named Abraham that lived about 4,000 years ago.  God tested Abraham and found that Abraham would believe what God said [6].  Above all else Abraham was a believer.  Because Abraham believed God, even for things that seemed impossible in the natural, God declared Abraham to be righteous, in right standing with God.  God promised Abraham that his descendents would be as numerous as the stars in the sky.  He also told Abraham that One of his descendents would be the Savior, the Man that would pay the price to redeem all of mankind.  Through belief in this Man and in this Man's sacrifice any man or woman can become God's child.

 For the next 2,500 years God worked with and through Abraham's descendents.  God gave Abraham's descedents a great deal of information about the coming Savior.  He told them that the Savior would be: 

Abraham's children wrote all of this information, and at least 100 additional details about the Savior, into a book.  All of Abraham's children were taught from the book so that when the Savior was born they would recognize Him.  God's family plan is based upon faith, upon what a person believes.  If a person recognizes the Savior, God's Son, and believes that He died and received the punishment that he, the person, deserved, then the person becomes adopted into God's family.  The person becomes God's child through faith.

Two thousand years ago God's Son, the Savior, was born to the young virgin woman in a Middle Eastern city called Bethleham.  God placed His Son's Spirit within the body of the baby.  The baby was named Jesus.  During his adult life He was known by the name Jesus of Nazareth.  Nazareth was His hometown.  God's Son, Jesus, laid down his Godly, supernatural powers [11] while He lived as a man.  Like all of mankind He slept, ate food, and became tired when he worked.  He experienced a very normal life until He was 30 years old, the age at which a boy became an adult in that culture.  At age 30 God's Holy Spirit came upon Jesus [12] and lived with Jesus for the rest of his life as a human being.  For the next 3.5 years Jesus taught people about his heavenly Father and He demonstrated God's love for mankind.  Through the supernatural power of God's Holy Spirit Jesus performed many miracles and healed many people of their diseases.

Although the book written by Abraham's children accurately described Jesus' life, most of the people did not believe He was the promised Savior.  They arranged for him to be killed.  He willingly allowed them to take His life because He came to die for them and for you and for me.  Three days after Jesus died, God's Holy Spirit brought Him back to life - raised from the dead.  For 40 days he taught the people about His loving heavenly Father [13].  Then He ascended into heaven to be reunited with His Father.  He promised to come again to earth to live and rule forever.

The Book written by and for God's children is called the Holy Bible.  The Bible says that you can become God's child by what you believe and what you confess.  If you believe that 1) Jesus of Nazareth is God's Son and that 2) He is your Savior, just say out loud "Jesus I believe that you are the Son of God!  I believe you are my Savior!  Thank you for saving me!  I am a child of God!."  

Now find your own copy of the Holy Bible and study it.  At first, focus on what is called the New Testament.  These are the books written after Jesus' life on earth.  Find a local Christian church so that you can make Christian friends and learn more from a Christian minister.  God bless you!

Holy Bible Notes:

[1]  1 John 3:2 Dear friends, now we are , and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when he appears,[ 3:2 Or when it is made known] we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.

[2] 1 John 4:16  And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him.

[3]  Isaiah 46:10  I make known the end from the beginning, from ancient times, what is still to come. I say: My purpose will stand, and I will do all that I please.

[4]  Romans 5:8  But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
 

[5]  John 3:16  For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

[6]  Hebrews 11:8  By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going. ⁹By faith he made his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. ¹⁰For he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God.
¹¹By faith Abraham, even though he was past age--and Sarah herself was barren--was enabled to become a father because he considered him faithful who had made the promise. ¹²And so from this one man, and he as good as dead, came descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as countless as the sand on the seashore.

[7]  Isaiah 9:6   For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders.  And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

[8]   Isaiah 7:14  Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son,...

[9]  Micah 5:2  But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times. 

[10]  Isaiah 53 3  He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering.  Like one from whom men hide their faces
he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

[11]  Philipians 2:6  Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped,   ⁷but made himself nothing,  taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness.   ⁸And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death-- even death on a cross!   ⁹Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name,  ¹⁰that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, ¹¹and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.  2 Corinthians 8:9 For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich.

[12]  John 1:29  The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, "Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! ³⁰This is the one I meant when I said, 'A man who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.' ³¹I myself did not know him, but the reason I came baptizing with water was that he might be revealed to Israel."
³²Then John gave this testimony: "I saw the Spirit come down from heaven as a dove and remain on him. ³³I would not have known him, except that the one who sent me to baptize with water told me, 'The man on whom you see the Spirit come down and remain is he who will baptize with the Holy Spirit.' ³⁴I have seen and I testify that this is the Son of God."

[13]  Acts 1:1 In my former book, Theophilus, I wrote about all that Jesus began to do and to teach ²until the day he was taken up to heaven, after giving instructions through the Holy Spirit to the apostles he had chosen. ³After his suffering, he showed himself to these men and gave many convincing proofs that he was alive. He appeared to them over a period of forty days and spoke about the kingdom of God.

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