Why?

It was the title of a book that was mentioned in a specific Christian web-site, that caught my attention: "If you could ask God one question." Just one?! I suspect that I could spend all of eternity asking one question after another - and eternity is not just "endless time", but "timelessness"!

But if I were to be put "on the spot", and had this amazing opportunity to ask just one question of Almighty God, the Creator and Sustainer of all that is, what would it be? Well, as soon as I started to think about it, I realised that, for me, it wouldn't take much thought! If I could ask God just one question, it would be just one word: "Why?".

Now, it may be that you want to know the rest of the question! After all, "Why?" isn't really a question if it is on its own. Did I mean: "Why did you allow Adam and Eve to introduce sin into Your perfect creation?". Or perhaps it should be more personal: "Why did you allow me to make that decision that, much later, I realised was a wrong decision?" Maybe it should be: "Why did (name a particular relative/friend) die in such pain from an inoperable cancer?"

Well these, and many others, may well be valid questions. However, because God is God and, therefore, omniscient (all-knowing), He would know exactly what I meant when I asked: "Why?". He would know that I was looking at myself, and wondering why He would come, in the Persona (not a typo!) of the Son, and pay the penalty that I deserve(d) to pay for my sins, and sinfulness.

Hymn-writer Isaac Watts phrased the thought like this:

"Alas! and did my Saviour bleed
And did my Sov’reign die?
Would He devote that sacred head
For such a worm as I?"

It's the mystery of the ages - the holy and sinless One becoming sin (II Cor.5:21) for you and for me!
And, actually, I already know - within my mortal level of comprehension - the answer to my question: "Why?" It's already been revealed in what may well be the best-known words from all of the Biblical writings. John, the beloved disciple, was inspired to write these word: "God loved the world (that's you and me!) so much, that He gave the only-begotten Son (Who came to this earth as the Lord Jesus), that all who place their trust in Him for salvation might not perish but, here and now, have God-quality life" (John 3:16; Ross paraphrase!). 

The celebration of that amazing event, when the Creator entered His creation, is still fresh in most of our minds. Many of us will have received gifts - from the sublime to the silly. I suspect that we will have gratefully received those gifts. However, we had the choice to reject them. To have done so would probably have upset the giver, and maybe even have destroyed a relationship. That would not have been good.

Rejecting the Gift of salvation through the Lord Jesus is MUCH more serious. Your eternal destiny depends, not on your social status; the importance of your job; your financial wealth; the size of your house, or car; or the number of exotic holidays you enjoy each year; but solely, and fully, on your relationship with Almighty God, through Jesus, the Christ.

Did you make any "New Year Resolutions"? If so, have you managed to keep any of them?! It's not too late to make one very important one - to come, in repentance and faith, to the foot of the Cross, and there yield your life to Jesus, receive the forgiveness of Father God, and go into the rest of the year in the power of God the Holy Spirit. Will you do that? Will you? You won't regret it if you do - either in this life, or in the life to come.