Life path

Everyone's life takes place on two levels, physical and spiritual. Physically, we are born in different places and in different environments, more or less friendly, and this determines what we can do. And what about our spiritual life?

We are all born with the same sinful nature, which means that from birth it is easier for us to sin than to live in harmony with God's commandments. No one is born as a good and just man, each of us inherited a sin-corrupt nature. Even if someone has not done something bad all his life, it does not mean that he is fair. The truth about our nature is revealed only when we have a real opportunity to do something wrong. The truth is revealed not so much in the decision as in the thinking process leading to the decision. Jesus said: „whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matthew 5:28). God's standards of justice are much higher than human and concern primarily thoughts and feelings. „I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin my mother conceived me” (Psalm 51:5). „For we have previously charged both Jews and Greeks that they are all under sin. As it is written: “There is none righteous, no, not one; There is none who understands; There is none who seeks after God. They have all turned aside; They have together become unprofitable; There is none who does good, no, not one (…) all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:9-12.23).

Everyone's spiritual life begins in a place that, unless there is a drastic change, does not give him a chance for salvation and eternal life in God's presence. If our future depended only on us, none of us would be saved. However, there is someone who cares more about our salvation than we do. It is God who created us, the one who loved us before we exist. God created us despite knowing that we would fall and turn our backs on Him. Why? Because for God it is not a problem what kind of birth we are. He does not judge us for what we have inherited spiritually from our ancestors. We will be judged for what we have done with the possibilities of changing our state, the possibilities given to us by God. Salvation is not dependent on achieving a particular state or knowledge, but on a desire to change and a willingness to accept and accept with all our heart what we get from God. The salvation of man depends on whether there has been a change in his life and in a spiritual sense he has become a new creature. „For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but a new creation” (Galatians 6:15). Our origin and past does not matter. It doesn't matter what we believed before. The apostle Paul wrote about the Gentiles: „for when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do the things in the law, these, although not having the law, are a law to themselves, who show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and between themselves their thoughts accusing or else excusing them” (Romans 2:14-15). According to Paul, such pagans are in a better position than those Jews who know the law but do not have it in their hearts. „Indeed you are called a Jew, and rest on the law, and make your boast in God, and know His will, and approve the things that are excellent, being instructed out of the law, and are confident that you yourself are a guide to the blind, a light to those who are in darkness, an instructor of the foolish, a teacher of babes, having the form of knowledge and truth in the law. You, therefore, who teach another, do you not teach yourself? You who preach that a man should not steal, do you steal? You who say, “Do not commit adultery,” do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples? You who make your boast in the law, do you dishonor God through breaking the law?” (Romans 2:17-23).

The knowledge of God depends on the possibilities. Gentiles have some possibilities, and those who consider themselves God's people have different possibilities. And what is important is not just the possibilities, but what we do with them. According to human criteria, 100 meters run win the one who is the first at the finish line. However, God judges it differently. According to God's criteria, the winner is the one who has used his full possibilities. Someone who could run a hundred meters in 10 seconds, but did this in 11 seconds, even if he was first at the finish, did not win this race at all. But one, who is able do it in 20 seconds, did this in 20 seconds, is the winner. By the way, only one man can win in human competitions, in God’s one everyone can be a winner. It all depends on whether a person has used the opportunities given to him. „For everyone to whom much is given, from him much will be required; and to whom much has been committed, of him they will ask the more” (Luke 12:48).

The need for spiritual change is the result of what happened in the garden of Eden. When God created Adam and Eve, they needed no change, only development and deepening of their relationship with God. „Man was originally endowed with noble powers and a well-balanced mind. He was perfect in his being, and in harmony with God. His thoughts were pure, his aims holy. But through disobedience, his powers were perverted, and selfishness took the place of love. His nature became so weakened through transgression that it was impossible for him, in his own strength, to resist the power of evil. He was made captive by Satan, and would have remained so forever had not God specially interposed” (EGW, SC 17.1). The purpose of the change is to restore the original state of balance of mind and harmony with God. Before sin „man held joyful communion with Him “in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.” (Colossians 2:3). But after his sin, he could no longer find joy in holiness, and he sought to hide from the presence of God. Such is still the condition of the unrenewed heart. It is not in harmony with God, and finds no joy in communion with Him. The sinner could not be happy in God’s presence; he would shrink from the companionship of holy beings. Could he be permitted to enter heaven, it would have no joy for him. The spirit of unselfish love that reigns there—every heart responding to the heart of Infinite Love—would touch no answering chord in his soul. His thoughts, his interests, his motives, would be alien to those that actuate the sinless dwellers there” (EGW, SC 17.2). As long as our thoughts, interests and motives do not change, we will not fit into God's reality, and thus we will not be able to be saved. This will not be the result of God's arbitrary decision, but our choice. Without a change of hearts and characters, we simply do not want to live in such conditions as prevail in the Kingdom of Heaven, even if we say that it is not.

So this change is necessary, but it is beyond our capabilities. „It is impossible for us, of ourselves, to escape from the pit of sin in which we are sunken. Our hearts are evil, and we cannot change them (…) Education, culture, the exercise of the will, human effort, all have their proper sphere, but here they are powerless. They may produce an outward correctness of behavior, but they cannot change the heart; they cannot purify the springs of life. There must be a power working from within, a new life from above” (EGW, DC 18.1). Fortunately, „with men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:26). Not only can God change us, but this is his ardent desire. There is only one condition, we must allow it. Only so much, but also so much, because our attachment to what is bad is beyond our imagination. One of our faults is that we like to think about ourselves well. „ I am rich, have become wealthy, and have need of nothing”. However, Jesus tells everyone who thinks this: „you are wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked” (Revelation 3:17). Our faults mean that we don't want to let our consciousness think that our spiritual condition is hopeless. And it is necessary for this state to change. The first step is to realize the truth about yourself. God helps us in this by revealing this truth to us step by step. God reveals two truths to us, about us and about Himself. He reveals our faults to us so that through comparison we can see how low we have fallen. He reveals also to us the depth of his love for us, fallen people, allows us to see how much he loves us and that he is ready to sacrifice everything for us, and the awareness of his love awakens in us the hope and desire to live next to such a wonderful and loving God. This desire is what is necessary for us to overcome the resistance of our sinful nature and allow God to begin to change our characters and hearts.

How is it with the possibilities that God gives us that our spiritual life may change? The Bible discusses this issue with the example of many people. One of them was Jacob, son of Isaac. Jacob was a good child and grew up a good man, but he had some disadvantages that led him to use a lie to get what God had once promised him. Was Jacob a bad man? Certainly not. He tried to be faithful and obedient to God, he also tried to live honestly. However, in moments of trial, when he had the opportunity to choose between trust and loyalty to God and deception, he chose the second option. And yet God did not abandon Jacob. On various occasions, he patiently revealed the truth to him, giving Jacob a chance to repent and convert. Intellectual acceptance of certain dogmas is not true faith. „The greatest deception of the human mind in Christ’s day was that a mere assent to the truth constitutes righteousness. In all human experience a theoretical knowledge of the truth has been proved to be insufficient for the saving of the soul. It does not bring forth the fruits of righteousness (…) The same danger still exists. Many take it for granted that they are Christians, simply because they subscribe to certain theological tenets. But they have not brought the truth into practical life. They have not believed and loved it, therefore they have not received the power and grace that come through sanctification of the truth. Men may profess faith in the truth; but if it does not make them sincere, kind, patient, forbearing, heavenly-minded, it is a curse to its possessors, and through their influence it is a curse to the world” (DA 309.2-3). Jacob believed in God, but this faith did not change his character, he did not remove his attachment to the wrong. Jacob believed, but he didn’t unconditionally trust God. In the moments of trial he trusted himself, not God. However, the moment came when Jacob broke the resistance of his sinful nature, humbled himself before God, confessed all his weaknesses, asked for help and received it. He stopped trusting himself and unconditionally trusted God. And how was Abraham? The story of him begins when Abraham was seventy-five years old. He believed in God and heard God's voice, he also obeyed God. However, at the time of trial, he did not trust the Creator, but trusted himself. When did he fully trust in God? When he was over a hundred years old and God tested him on Mount Moria. Another example is the apostle Paul. How many years God patiently revealed the truth to him, and Paul, as Saul, would not accept it? And what about King David?

There are also examples in the Bible of people who once did not believe in God, but they used the opportunities given to them and finally truly believed in Him. They believed and trusted Him. Such a person was Rachab from Jericho. Such a man was Naaman, leader of the army of the king of Assyria. They were also Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, Simon of Cyrene and a Greek woman whose daughter was possessed by demon. They were people who were once pagans, but when God revealed the truth about himself to them, they believed in Him and it changed their lives. It was the same with me. God revealed himself to me for most of my life, but I didn't even want to accept that He existed. I was an atheist for many years. However, God patiently repeated his attempts to reach my heart and I finally understood that atheism is only a false religion. I understood that God exists, but this was only the beginning. My life is proof of what Ellen White wrote about the greatest error of human minds in the days of Christ. I also believed for quite a long time that it is enough to believe in the existence of God and it is enough to accept certain biblical truths to become a Christian and to be saved. However, this is not true. Belief in the existence of God is only a change of views about the universe and does not cause this change, which is a condition of salvation, but it is necessary to gain trust in God, that is, to truly believe in Him.

How many Christians today are convinced that they are truly Christ's disciples? Are they right? The Bible tells us that, unfortunately, not. „Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. 22Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ 23And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness” (Matthew 7:21-23). And since Jesus warns us that most Christians make a fatal mistake, maybe it is worth checking if we are really Christians and if the change that is necessary for salvation has taken place in us? This change concerns our hearts. Without this change, our thoughts, interests and motives are different from those of the sinless inhabitants of heaven. Without this change, there are in our lives these "works of the flesh", that the apostle Paul described in his letter to the Galatians. Without this change, what Paul has called the fruit of the Spirit is not present in us. I know that many of us like to read this passage in a special way. It consists in the fact that we are content with revealing some ingredients of the fruit of the Spirit in our lives, and at the same time we believe that some works of flesh, appearing from time to time, are irrelevant. However, the truth is different. The appearance of even one work of flesh indicates that your life does not give the fruit of the Spirit, and what seems to be the fruit to us is only a counterfeit. "A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit" (Matthew 7:18). This condition does not disqualify us as Christians, but testifies that God has not yet finished his work, and we are still attached to something that does not come from God.

Dear brothers and sisters. Let's stop judging ourselves based on what we do. It is not deeds that determine who we are, but our motivation. Good deeds are important, but more important is why we do all kinds of good things. Bad motivation means that what seems to be good is worthless to the one who does it. It doesn't matter that we are in the church every Sabbath (apart from the circumstances we have now). It doesn't matter that we bring tithes, we give offerings, and participate in evangelistic work. It does not matter that we help the poor and the sick, if these activities are not the result of love for God and for our neighbours. Our characters determine why we do something. And the truth about our characters is revealed in these moments when we make decisions to be obedient to God or not. Even in small matters.

Because of how we are born, none of us can be saved. The only way to salvation is through a change of heart and character, and everyone has a chance for such a change. God does everything to make us desire to become a new creature, free from vices and filled with God's love. For this to happen, we must begin to use the opportunities that God gives us. We must begin to respond to God's call and allow Him to act in us. Let everyone who has not yet come on this path find it as soon as possible, and those who are already on it, with God's help persevere on it to the end.