are you interested in these things?

"If you want to know whether you are a true Christian

I ask you to face two questions...

Have you seen yourself as a hopeless lost sinner in the sight of a holy God?

Is the Lord Jesus Christ essential to you to deliver you from the wrath of God 

and to reconcile you to God?

Let me put it still more specifically in a third question...

Is Jesus' death on the cross absolutely vital to you?

The Apostle Paul said this to the Corinthians...

'I determined not to know anything among you, save Jesus Christ, and Him crucified.'

I Corinthians 2:2

If you would come within the scope of the things we have heard, 

the death of Christ on the cross will be to you central, vital, absolute.

You say you realize that if He had not died on the cross

 you would have no hope of having your sins forgiven,

 no hope of seeing God, 

no hope of heaven;

 you know you would be destined for hell and eternal misery.

These are the things that are central and vital and essential.

These are the things that were preached in the book of Acts.

Read the sermon that Peter preached on the day of Pentecost.

Isn't this the truth he preached.

isn't it what Paul preached,

isn't it the argument of every one of the New Testament epistles ~

the blood of Christ,

his death on the cross,

 to the Jews a stumbling block, to the Greeks foolishness? 

These men put this message in the forefront in spite of everything.

Why?

Because they had no gospel apart from it.

Are you interested in these things?

I say again solemnly,

 before you begin to consider your happiness, 

before you long to be delivered from worry,

 before you yearn for comfort for your broken heart,

 before you want guidance, 

before you seek healing for your body, 

before you want to get in tune with the infinite... 

Face the fact of your spiritual state.

All of us, we are in a passing, transient world.

We are at this moment a living soul going on inevitably to a final day,

and as you do so,

salvation is your first need, 

the need of knowing God,

 knowing He has forgiven you,

knowing that He is your Father in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Prepare for your latter end.

Make certain that you are ready to die,

and that you are ready to meet God,

that you know Jesus Christ, the son of God,

 who came into this world to reconcile you to God by dying for your sins and by rising to justify you.

I promise you if you get to know God like that,

 you can take your other problems one by one to Him with confidence, 

and He will never say nay.

But God forbid that anyone should ever find temporary satisfaction for lesser needs 

without having first of all satisfied the need of the soul for Jesus Christ and Him crucified.

Amen"

From...

A Merciful and Faithful High Priest

by Martyn Lloyd-Jones

Pages 20 &21

I've never heard it put better...

our supreme need for Jesus Christ and Him crucified.

Please read and consider.

cathy