David Diga Hernandez - Your SOUL is Eternal: Where Will You Spend the Afterlife?

This is what the Bible says, Romans 3:23, «For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard». What the scripture is telling us here is twofold. Number one, the Bible is telling us that God has a standard that He expects us to live up to and the sad reality is that none of us have lived up to that standard. All of us have sinned. All of us have done something that violates God’s holy standard. He created us to live a certain way. He created us with a certain purpose in mind and every single one of us, at some point, has gone away from that path.

1 John 1:10 says, «If we claim we have not sinned, we are calling God a liar and showing that His word has no place in our hearts». In other words, the Bible is saying all of us, yes, certainly have sinned and if we claim otherwise, if we claim that we’re perfect, if we claim that we’ve never done anything wrong, then clearly we are not understanding what God’s standard actually is. Now, when you hear this, it’s easy to imagine that God is some celestial dictator who never wants you to have anything that’s filled with joy or anything that’s filled with pleasure and that’s simply not the case. Imagine this. Imagine someone comes up to you and gives to you a brand new sports car, maybe a Ferrari, Lamborghini, whatever your preference is and they say, «I’ll pay the insurance. I’ll pay all of the fuel costs and I’ll pay the car off cash for you. I only ask that you don’t drive it off road, you don’t drive into the ocean and that you keep it properly maintained».

Who would look at that person and say, «How dare you try to control my life? How dare you try to take away my fun? How dare you tell me to not drive it off road? What if I want to drive it off road? How dare you tell me not to drive it into the ocean? What if that’s where I wanna take it? And how dare you tell me to maintain it properly»? Anyone who would say that in that specific situation would be ungrateful. Well in the same way, God has given you life and breath and animation. He’s given you everything that you have that is good. He simply asks that we keep His standard. Now, here is the bad news. None of us can keep that standard. God is just too holy. None of us have kept that standard. We are all sinful. And the Bible says this in Matthew 25:46, «And they will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous will go into eternal life».

Hebrews 9:27, «And just as each person is destined to die once and after that comes judgment». Because God is a good God because God is just God, He must punish sin. It’s amazing to me that whenever we see news articles on Facebook or on social media, about a murderer or a rapist, we immediately respond in the affirmative when we find that they were punished, we know deep in our hearts when justice is done and I’ll read the comments sometimes on articles like that and I see people commenting, «Yes, give them what they deserve». «That’s what they earn». «I’m glad they got justice». «Good for the family who got justice». It’s amazing to me that when it comes to the sins of others, we demand justice. When it comes to our own sins, we cry out for mercy, for understanding, for grace. There is a punishment for sin but not because God is cruel or evil, there is a punishment for sin because God is just. There is a heaven and there is a hell and the only difference between the two is salvation through Christ Jesus.

Now, anyone who’s offended at that doesn’t understand the weight of sin. If you are offended by the idea of punishment in hell, then you’re not offended enough by the sin in your life. Sin is that wicked, sin is that evil that it must be punished and so God, because He is just because He is good, must punish sin, but He’s also merciful. So, what is the way out? Because all of us have sinned, none of us have kept God’s standard and there’s punishment for sin. What then do we do? Do we say, «Okay, I’ll live a good life from this point on».

Well, think about the case of a murderer. If they murdered someone and said, «Well, from this day on, I won’t kill anybody again and I’ll do my best to be a good member of society». Would we no longer require that they be punished for that murder? No. Why? Because justice must be satisfied. And by the way, even if we went on living perfect, sinless lives from this moment on, it wouldn’t matter, because sin has already been committed. So we can’t save ourselves. You can go to church all you want, it won’t save you. You can read the Bible all you want, it won’t save you. You can pray all you want, it won’t save you. None of our actions can save us. We can’t save ourselves. That’s the whole point of why Jesus came.

Now, Jesus alone is the one who saves, it is not our actions, it is not our work, it’s not by our own efforts, it’s simply a free gift. The Bible says this in Romans 3:21–22, «But now God has shown us a way to be made right with Him without keeping the requirements of the law, as was promised in the writings of Moses and the prophets long ago. We are made right with God by placing our faith in Jesus Christ. And this is true for everyone who believes, no matter who we are».

John 3:16–19 says, «For this is how God loved the world. He gave His one and only Son so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish, but have eternal life. God sent His Son into the world, not to judge the world but to save the world through Him. There is no judgment against anyone who believes in Him but anyone who does not believe in Him has already been judged for not believing in God’s one and only Son. And the judgment is based on this fact: God’s light came the world, but people loved the darkness more than the light, for their actions were evil».

You see, when Jesus came to the earth to die on the cross, He came to die in your place. When you look at the crucifixion of Jesus, how He was whipped, how He was bruised, how He was beaten, how they drove nailed through His hands and through His feet, what you’re looking at is punishment for sin. What you’re looking at is the wrath of God. What you’re looking at is the result of disobedience and Jesus took your place. He died on the cross, in your place. In this way, God was able to satisfy justice, while at the same time showing you grace. Only Jesus lived the perfect life and therefore only Jesus could make the perfect sacrifice, His life laid down for yours and the gospel is that simple. Jesus will give you eternal life in exchange for your temporary one. Jesus will give you His righteousness in exchange for your sin and this is why so many people have trouble believing these good news, because it sounds too good to be true.

Now, of course, anyone who truly believes in Jesus will be transformed. Anyone who truly believes in Christ Jesus will turn from their sin, will walk in holiness, will pursue righteousness. But here’s the truth, the reason people reject Jesus is simply because they don’t wanna humble themselves before Him. We can make up all of our excuses. «Oh, I don’t believe in God». You can say that but your conscience bears the truth against you.

You could say, «Well, I’ve been too sinful. God can’t forgive me». But the blood of Jesus can wash away all sin, no matter what it is. You may say, «Well I don’t know if I can truly live the Christian life or if that’s for me». God will help you live whatever life He has called you to live. All you have to do is surrender. If you ever went in for an operation, you know that you weren’t the one that performed the operation on yourself. They had to put you to sleep before they could perform the operation. But you had to surrender and get on the operating table.

You see, when we surrender to God, it’s not that we’re saving ourselves. It’s not that we’re working for our salvation. There’s nothing we could do to save ourselves. Rather, what we’re doing is we’re putting ourselves on that table and saying, «Okay, God, you operate». It’s simply surrendering to Him. It’s saying to Him, «Lord, I agree with you. Sinful living is wrong. The way I’m living my life is not according to your will, and I can’t save myself, I’m helpless without you. Even if I lived a perfect life for the rest of my life, it still wouldn’t be good enough for your standard». And so we’re left with only one option,