These are the Facts
By Editorial Staff
Published April 8, 2008
Love
God made you and loves you more than you could ever imagine. He also knows everything about you: your past, your problems, and your feelings. He wants to change your life.
Everything God does is out of love. This love is not based on feelings, but always chooses for your highest good.
“Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.”
Selfishness
Sin is really selfishness, living for self only, a “me-first” attitude. Sin denies God the right to be God in your life. Because of this, you feel lonely, guilty, and afraid.
Hate
God hates sin because it cost so much. He never planned sin or unhappiness, and that is why He feels so much heartache over you. It is destroying His universe, it is destroying you, and it cost God His only Son, Jesus Christ. Because He is just, He cannot allow sin to go unpunished. Otherwise, the entire universe would collapse. You see, a law without penalty simply becomes advice. There must be a penalty as important as the law it is designed to protect.
Consequences
As a sinner, you deserve to be punished. Deep down inside you know that. By rights, you should pay the penalty for your sin. If you are really honest, you will admit that you knew what was right but you didn’t do it. You have no excuses. “If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us.”
Escape
But, in His great love and wisdom God found a way to forgive you and still be just, if you are willing to meet His conditions, not your own. The Lord Jesus offered His own perfect life as a sacrificial substitute for the penalty of your sin. You can choose one of two things: pay the penalty of sin yourself, or resolve to turn your back on the past and give your life to God.
Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life …”
Rethink
Stop running away from the voice of God. You must be totally honest with yourself and God. Stop making excuses. Admit it from your heart, “I am all wrong.” If necessary write down everything that has prevented you from serving Him as you should.
Repent
Turn your back on your old way of life. Be willing to give up any habit, plan or friend you have been living your life for instead of God.
Renounce
Give up all rights to your life. You must be willing to let God be your boss from now on. A true Christian has nothing of his own. All his time. talents, money, possessions, friends, career, and future must be surrendered for his King’s service.
God knows best and will never ask you to do anything you will regret in the end.
Replan
Be ready to make many changes in your life. The very moment you make this heart choice for God, the old you will die and a new person inside you will begin to live. Wherever you need to confess wrong, or restore or repay something to someone, the Lord Jesus will give you the courage and the words to say. Becoming a Christian implies the willingness to right all known wrong.
Receive
… the Lord Jesus Christ by faith to rule in your heart as king. This is a choice of your will made intelligently and carefully. Trust, surrender, believe from your heart, be totally honest with Him. Receive Christ into your life as Lord and master and live for Him from this moment on.
Ready
There is no time like now. God has done all He can for you. The next move must be yours. Are you willing to trust His love? Or will you choose a future without Christ and without hope? Would you be very honest with Him right now? Tell Him in your own words something like this:
A true prayer for conversion
I freely admit that I am a sinner. I’ve sinned against my God, against my neighbors and against my own soul. I’ve sinned in the world, in my business and pleasures. I’ve done many things I should not have done and left undone things I should have done.
I will not cover my sins. They are more than I can count and grievous beyond the possibility of calculation. They have dishonored my Heavenly Father; treated the sacrifice of Jesus with contempt; exercised a bad influence upon the members of my own family as well as upon those who have known me in the world. I deserve the everlasting displeasure of God, and I see that if I die in my sins, I shall fall into the damnation of Hell.
O Lord, have mercy upon me!
Not only do I see that I’ve sinned against God, but I am truly sorry for what I’ve done. I honestly hate my evil ways, and I deeply regret the damage that has been done for having followed them. I am grieved on account of my sins – not only because they have led me to the brink of Hell, but because they have been committed against my Heavenly Father who has continually loved and cared for me.
If I could undo the past, I’d gladly do so; but I can’t! The sins I’ve committed are written down against me in the book of God’s remembrance. No prayers I can offer, no tears I can shed, no mourning I can do, nor good works I can perform will remove that terrible record. My only hope is in the forgiving mercy of Jesus Christ who has said, “Him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.”
I am sorry because of my sins, and I freely confess and acknowledge them before God. I have no excuse to make for them. It may be true that much of the evil of which I am guilty was done in ignorance, but I am sorry for this, too.
I was often ignorant of the evil influence which my conduct and example were exercising on others. But this ignorance is no real excuse, because I might have known better. I didn’t know God, nor my duty to Him, nor the greatness of the love of my Savior in dying for me. I should have read the Bible and listened to those who would have taught me. I should have thought about my soul and should have cried to God for help. But I didn’t, and consequently my mouth is closed before Him, helpless to make a single, valid excuse. I here and now confess myself before God to be a guilty sinner, without excuse, deserving only His condemnation.
I’ve sinned in the presence of my family, friends and the people around me. Not only do I make this confession in private, but I am perfectly willing to confess my sinfulness and the sorrow caused by it, to the extent I have the opportunity, before the Lord’s people, my own family and the world. Not having been ashamed to sin in the presence of others, I’m willing to acknowledge it in their presence. I also realize that because of the nature of certain sins I should confess them to God alone.
I have seen myself to be a sinner and have confessed my sins before God and others. With God’s help I now renounce and turn away from every one of my past sins. Whatever pleasure sin may have brought me in the past and whatever earthly gain temptation may promise me in the future, I have and now, in the strength of God, put sin away from my life, never to go back again.
Feeling how shamefully I’ve rebelled against my Heavenly Father (in despising His love, in breaking His commandments and influencing others to do the same), I submit myself to Him here on my knees right now. Lord, I humbly pray that you will have mercy upon me, a miserable sinner; and I ask you for Christ’s sake to forgive all my sins, to receive me into your arms; and to make me, unworthy though I am, a member of your family.
I promise you, Heavenly Father, in your strength and with all my heart as you forgive me and receive me into your favor, that I determine from now on to be your faithful servant, spending the rest of my days doing what I can for your glory, for the extension of your kingdom and for the salvation of those around me.
I believe that Jesus Christ, God’s Son, in His great mercy and love, having died for me in my place, bore my sins in His own body on the cross.
Believing this, I here and now welcome you, Jesus, into my heart as my Savior from hell, from sin, from the power of the devil and from my ownself-righteousness.
Your Word says that if I come to you, you will in no wise cast me out; and I come to you with all my heart just now, as a helpless, guilty sinner, seeking salvation and trusting only in your blood.
I am sure you will not reject me. Rather, I believe at this very moment you are taking me into your family. Thank you for forgiving me and for your precious blood that washes all my sins away. You were wounded for my transgression; you were bruised for my iniquities; the punishment I should have received was laid upon you; and by your sufferings I am healed.
I am forgiven! Praise the Lord! Thank you, Jesus, for salvation!
© 1983 Agape Force. Portions of this tract are used by permission from “These Are the Facts,” by Winkie Pratney. Other portions are adapted from “How to Be Saved,” by William Booth.
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