Subject 13 : The Gospel According to MATTHEW
[Chapter 22-3] Put on the Garment of The Remission of Sins (Matthew 22:1-14)
(Matthew 22:1-14)
“And Jesus answered and spoke to them again by parables and said: ‘The kingdom of heaven is like a certain king who arranged a marriage for his son, and sent out his servants to call those who were invited to the wedding; and they were not willing to come. Again, he sent out other servants, saying, ‘Tell those who are invited, ‘See, I have prepared my dinner; my oxen and fatted cattle are killed, and all things are ready. Come to the wedding.’’ But they made light of it and went their ways, one to his own farm, another to his business. And the rest seized his servants, treated them spitefully, and killed them. But when the king heard about it, he was furious. And he sent out his armies, destroyed those murderers, and burned up their city. Then he said to his servants, ‘The wedding is ready, but those who were invited were not worthy. Therefore go into the highways, and as many as you find, invite to the wedding.’ So those servants went out into the highways and gathered together all whom they found, both bad and good. And the wedding hall was filled with guests. ‘But when the king came in to see the guests, he saw a man there who did not have on a wedding garment. So he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you come in here without a wedding garment?’ And he was speechless. Then the king said to the servants, ‘Bind him hand and foot, take him away, and cast him into outer darkness; there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ For many are called, but few are chosen.’”
In the Scripture passage that we read today, there is a parable about a king inviting people to the feast for his son’s wedding. It said that some people received an invitation to the wedding feast of the king’s son, and enjoyed happiness there. But someone was cast out for not having a wedding garment. Who do you think this King of the entire universe is? Who is the King of all kings? He is God. God is the King of the entire universe. Also, that King is Jesus Christ. That is why people say, “My King, Jesus.” That King is none other than God who has created this world, and the Savior who has saved us.
If a man in a high position were to invite a servant of lower status to his son’s feast, and the person of lower status did not attend the feast, wouldn’t that be a sin? It is a sin. The Bible says it plainly. The Bible is the Truth. Truth is simple. The Bible writes that the son of a king was getting married. The king had invited people to that wedding feast, but many people did not attend. Not only did many people attend, they made excuses saying, “I must go and purchase oxen” and “I must go and make sales for my business”. Not only that; they treated the servants of the king spitefully.
We must be thankful for being born in this day and age. In Korea, our ancestors called Christianity, ‘Yaso-gyo.’ It was because the name Jesus written in Chinese characters was pronounced ‘Yaso.’ Because of the elders’ explicit orders, “You mustn’t go to Yaso-gyo” and their use of coercion, many people were fearful of believing in Jesus and did not even go near it. They said, “Do not go to chapels. If you go to a chapel, they will tell you to close you eyes and then steal your shoes. Don’t ever go to the chapel.” During those days, many people went about their business of farming and engaging in trade. But they did not come to church. How is Korea now? About 25% of Koreans believe in Jesus now. You are living in a blessed age.
People appearing in today’s Scripture passage did not go to the feast even though they received the king’s invitation. And what is worse, they seized the servants of the king, they treated them spitefully, beat them, and finally killed them. Even though this happened, why did the servants of the king keep on inviting people despite being killed? Though the servants asked them to come, they refused. Doesn’t the fault lie with those who did not come?
Let’s say there was a wedding feast in a village, and the host sends his servants to invite you to the feast. They say to you, “We are holding a feast. Come and have a bowl of noodles and a bowl of rice wine.” If you don’t come, then it’s your loss. It’s true that there were hardly anything to eat in the past. It was so bad that many people died during spring famine. If a feast was being held at someone’s house, then that was a day when the whole neighborhood was fed. When one hears of a feast being held at someone’s house, he or she would start fasting the day before, because on that day there would be much to eat. And on the day of the feast, the person would eat until his or her stomach was full. If someone doesn’t go to that feast, it will only be that person’s loss.
All that the servants had to do was to convey king’s message of invitation to people. They would tell people, “The only son of His Majesty the King is getting married and the King wants you to come. Please come to the feast. Make the feast glorious, have some food, and give congratulations.” It was up to the one who was invited to decide whether or not to come. The only thing the servants had to do was to convey the message and then come back. But, if we look at the Scripture passage, it is said that people seized the servants and killed them as they started to speak. Do you think they did this because the servants were bothering them? The servants came and forced people saying, “You must come.” Some people said, “I must go plow the field with my oxen right now” and others said, “I must go and do business. Yet, what are you saying?” The servants insisted that the people accept the invitation saying, “Still, you must come.” Some people might have said, “Why must I go?”
Dear fellow believers, do you think the servants just invited people? Do you think the people would have killed the servants if they had spoken like a gentleman? More than likely, the servants must have been persistent. They must have said, “If you don’t come, you will surely go to hell” and “If you don’t come, you will be ruined.” Because there was pity for the invited people in their hearts, the servants had to be persistent in inviting them. They were persistent because they knew that if people were to refuse the invitation, the king would destroy them. Because, knowing the will of the king, they were aware that the king would send the army to kill people.
The servants invited the people, but the people did not come. People are fundamentally stubborn. In Korea, there is a proverb which says “Not even weeds grow on a place where a person whose family name is Choi and whose hair is curly used to sit.” Perhaps it’s because there is a groundless stereotype against Choi’s being very stubborn. Choi’s in our Church seem stubborn to me also. Those among us don’t know how stubborn Pastor Choi is. The fact is Pastor Choi has curly hair.
However, do you think only the Choi’s are stubborn? Do you think that people with the family name other than Choi such as Kim, Lee, or Park are not stubborn? Honestly speaking, those with the family name Park are also unspeakably stubborn. It isn’t just the Park’s, but all people, regardless of their name, are as stubborn as mules.
People did not accept king’s invitation because they were all stubborn. So the king told his servants, “Go into the highways, and as many as you find, invite them to the wedding. Whether they are wicked or virtuous, just bring them. Fill up the seats.” Thus, all were brought; the wicked, the virtuous, and the seats were filled. And just as they were all preparing to eat, the king entered. He came in and moved slowly about thanking the guests seated at the table. Just then, his eyes became fixed on someone. Then, he asked the person, “Why are you sitting here without a wedding garment?” Because the person without a wedding garment wasn’t able to say anything, and just mumbled, the king said, “My royal servants! Hear me. Bind him hand and foot, and cast him into outer darkness.”
Why would the king do this despite having invited them as guests? It is something that doesn’t make sense from a human perspective. The king mentioned here refers to God. The wedding feast of his son refers to Jesus Christ’s feast. God had invited all people to the wedding feast in His Kingdom. Just as there is happiness and abundance at a wedding feast, there is the same joy and richness in the Kingdom of God. Just like that wedding feast, God had invited people to the Kingdom of Heaven.
Today’s Scripture passage is telling us that very clearly. Anyone who receives the invitation and attends the feast wearing a wedding garment will live there in happiness. There will never be a curse there. Music will be playing. We will be eating food, taking in beautiful scenery at the water’s edge, watching beautiful trees, flowers, and animals, and forever controlling the angels as servants. God who is the King created Heaven, and invited us to join Him there.
Do you believe that there is a Heaven? We believe there surely is a Heaven. Just as there is sky and land, as well as night and day, there is a Heaven and hell. In chapter 3 of the Gospel of Matthew, God speaks of Heaven and hell in metaphor: “He will thoroughly clean out His threshing floor, and gather His wheat into the barn; but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire” (Matthew 3:12). He says to us that those who have received the remission of sins will be gathered into Heaven, just as wheat is gathered into the barn. Those who haven’t received the remission of sins will be burned in hell, like the chaff brought to a paddy or a field and burned up. God has invited us into Heaven.
Dear fellow believers, if we go to a wedding feast, we must go wearing a wedding garment. In order to go to the Kingdom of Heaven, all you have to do is to go wearing a garment. Wearing a wedding garment means to receive the remission of sins in one’s heart. This so-called garment is the receiving of the cleansing of one’s sins for the heart. The Kingdom of Heaven is a place where anyone can enter after receiving the remission of sins. However, people are reluctant to believe in the gospel of the water and the Spirit, which is what brings them the remission of sins.
In the Book of Ecclesiastes, it is said, “A good name is better than precious ointment, and the day of death than the day of one’s birth; better to go to the house of mourning than to go to the house of feasting, for that is the end of all men; and the living will take it to heart” (Ecclesiastes 7:1-2). It tells us that it is better to go to a house of mourning than to go to a house of feasting, and that the day of death is better than the day of one’s birth. How can dying be better than getting born? When a child is born, Koreans celebrate and make seaweed soup, saying it is a joyful occasion. Just like this, people think that birth is better. The Word of God says that the day of death is better than the day of one’s birth. God also says that going to a house of mourning is better than going to a house of feasting.
Living on this earth, human beings think that this place is all that there is. Even though they think so, they are born once and then die once. God made it so people can enter the Kingdom of Heaven and go on living; tasting everlasting joy and pleasure in an eternal Heaven, only if they receive the remission of sins. God has prepared Heaven for our next life. While we are in this world, He tells us to receive the remission of sins. That is why God is telling us that the day of death is better than the day of one’s birth. We must realize this fact. It is better to go to a house of mourning than a house of feasting (Ecclesiastes 7:1-2).
Of course, this saying does not make sense to the younger generation. In the past, when we go to a house of mourning, people talk about the life of the deceased and pray to their respective god to deliver that person to a “good place.” The atmosphere was solemn, and it was time for one to look back at one’s own life. What about people today? They go to a house of mourning, and instead of thinking about their own lives, they play cards and drink liquor. Do those people go there to offer condolence? No. They just go there to play cards and enjoy themselves.
When we are at a house of mourning, we must try to put ourselves in the shoes of the deceased. People are different from animals because they think about the future and their own end. Where will we go if we were to die without having received the remission of sins? We will go to hell. Doesn’t your own conscience tell you that ‘you are headed for hell’?
All people will suffer death. The Bible says that all people will die having done crazy things with anger in their hearts their entire lives. In the Book of Ecclesiastes chapter 9 verse 3, it is said, “This is an evil in all that is done under the sun: that one thing happens to all. Truly the hearts of the sons of men are full of evil; madness is in their hearts while they live, and after that they go to the dead.” And also, it is said, “For man also does not know his time; like fish taken in a cruel net, like birds caught in a snare, so the sons of men are snared in an evil time, when it fall suddenly upon them” (Ecclesiastes 9:12).
Fellow believers, when do fish get caught in a net? They don’t know when the people will come to catch them. How is it possible for fish to know when the people will be coming carrying nets to snatch them up? One day, a calamity will strike unexpectedly.
It is the same for people. People leave for the next world all of a sudden, having been engaging in a trade, doing business, getting a husband, getting a wife, saving money, building a house, or planning for the future in this world. Dear fellow believer, people get snared also when the day of disaster suddenly arrives. Do we have the ability to avoid death? “As it is appointed by God for men to die once.” (Hebrews 9:27) There is no human being that does not die? Can you say that you do won’t die because you are young? Can you say that you won’t die for 50 years? Even human beings get caught in a disaster that comes all of a sudden.
Someone makes a phone call. “How are you? Please put so and so on the phone.”
“Oh no, what am I to do. He left during the night.”
“Where did he go to? Did he go on a summer vacation? Where did he go?”
“He went far, far away into the next world.”
For me to have lived this long is a miracle among miracles. When I was in my early twenties, I was very ill. While I was sick, I looked at people whose hair was gray, and I used to get very envious, saying, “Wow, they have been living in this world, which is so difficult to survive in, until their hair has turned gray. This is a blessing. It is a blessing. I don’t think I will be able to live past the age of thirty.” There was a time when I had such thoughts. But, God let me live, and I have been living up to now. Now people tell me that I have rejuvenated even more, and it makes me feel happy to hear that. Dear fellow believers, if your faith is righteous before God, then your body as well as your heart gains renewed strength. No matter what, we must think about the fact that we ourselves have to die. We must think about our own weaknesses, and that we will surely stand before God one day.
Dear fellow believers, have you received the remission of sins? Today’s Scripture passage says that the king called out the person who hadn’t worn the wedding garment and told the servants to bind him hand and foot, take him away, and cast him out into outer darkness. And then, have you received the remission of sins? To receive the remission of sins means to prepare the wedding garment in your heart. A garment refers to beautiful clean clothes. The garment for entering the Kingdom of Heaven is a heart that is in absolute perfection, without a single sin, as white as snow. Have your hearts turned as white as snow?
Some would say, “My word, that pastor says his heart is as white as snow. He commits sins every day. How can his heart be as white as snow?” A human being cannot do that work. Only God can do it. God created this universe all at once with His Word. “Then God said, ‘Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear’; and it was so” (Genesis 1:9). Originally, this earth was covered with water. But, the seas appeared suddenly when God said let the dry land appear. God had also set a boundary and commanded the seas never to come over the boundary. The Word that was said back then has same effect even today. Even if seawater wants to go against a river’s flow, it cannot. From the days of His Creation, it has never gone against the current according to its own will. The Word of God is the Truth.
We must wear the garment in our hearts. How can you think about going to Heaven with sins still in your heart? How can you face death with sins still there? You clearly know that if you were to die as a sinner, you would go before God, receive judgment, and fall into hell. Yet why are you thinking about facing death the way you are with sins in your heart? We must all prepare the garment.
In today’s Scripture passage, there was a man who had been cast out of wedding feast. Instead of a wedding garment, he was wearing his own clothes. He was cast out because he had been wearing clothes according to his own thinking. Having thought on his own that the king would like them, he had come wearing designer clothes. Let us consider for a moment that he was wearing formal attire embellished with gold buttons and collars that are over 20cm long. He was secretly boasting saying, “Would someone take a look at my attire?”
Then the king, the father of the groom, came in. The man who was wearing clothes he had prepared himself, instead of wearing the garment that the master of the wedding had prepared and was handing out, was feeling triumphant, thinking, “These people are all wearing a plain white outer coat, but look at me. The collar on these people is only 5cm long, but mine is 20cm long. Since they don’t know fashion and are wearing poor looking clothes, everyone’s eyes will surely be upon me.”
However, when the master came in, instead of saying, “Thank you for coming to this wedding ceremony wearing such fine fashionable clothes,” the master became angry and said, “Why did you come in here without the wedding garment that I had given you?” He was perplexed for a moment, but he waited for the next words. He thought, “If I wait a bit, he will surely say that my clothes look splendid, nevertheless.”
But the king was calling for his servants, crying out, “Come here.” The man was thinking, “Alas, I think he is now calling people to have me brag about my clothing.” But instead, the king said, “Come and bind this man hand and foot. Then, take him away, and cast him into outer darkness.”
“Oh my God, what does he mean?”
In order to enter the Kingdom of Heaven, we must prepare the wedding garment. Even if our own actions are lacking and if we have not been educated, we know that we only get to go to Heaven if we have prepared the wedding garment. All human beings are born once and die once. After death, they stand before God. The question is whether or not you have prepared the wedding garment.
I started believing in Jesus when I was in my early 20’s. But back then, even though I had faith in Jesus, I didn’t know what the wedding garment really meant. Before that, of course, I had tried to live right. But as I got older, I had made many mistakes as well. And so my clothes were all covered with dirt. My heart became full of scars, spots, and flaws. I tried to live recklessly later on, letting things just happen. Still, because I had a little bit of conscience, I had tried to live properly, but it didn’t turn out that way. That tormented me. But the Lord had clothed me with the wedding garment He had made. Only when I became thirty years old, was I able to be prepared with the proper wedding garment.
In spite of all this, it doesn’t mean that I had led a rough life prior to having received the remission of sins. I did many good deeds back then, such as finding homes for children who got lost, and carrying heavy loads for the elderly. But for all that, the wedding garment wasn’t prepared inside my heart. My heart was clothed with the wedding garment only after I had put on the wedding garment Jesus Christ had prepared for me. Only then did I become a person who could invite other people to wear this wedding garment.
What sort of people are those who have on the wedding garment? They are people who have no sins in their hearts. Sins committed by a person get recorded in his or her heart. It proves that those who still haven’t received the remission of sins are those who do not have on the wedding garment.
Do you have sins in your heart? If there still is even a slight bit of a sin, then you still haven’t prepared the wedding garment. Despite having faith in Jesus, Buddha, or any other gods, if you have sins in your heart, then it shows that you haven’t put on the wedding garment. Those who can come to the wedding feast prepared and be blessed by God are those who have come wearing the wedding garment. That is, those who have received the remission of sins by having faith in the gospel of the water and the Spirit.
A person who is wearing a garment prepared on one’s own could protest, “I have done many good deeds and I have carried out many kind acts. I fervently believe in Jesus, and if you exclude filth inside me, I am no different from Buddha. I do not do evil, yet why do you say such things? From the way you talk, it seems you have not lived a life purer than mine.” Dear fellow believers, a human being doesn’t go to the Kingdom of Heaven on one’s own efforts. Having prepared the wedding garment at the entrance of the wedding feast in Heaven, God made it so that each person entering can take off and change the clothes he or she had been wearing in the world and enter wearing the wedding garment.
Do you have sins in your hearts? You surely have no sin in your hearts. Is there someone who thinks, “Right now, there are only about 200 people gathered here, yet how come all these people are saying they do not have any sin? It is strange. Go anywhere in this world. See if there is a person who says he or she does not have a sin.” However, on this earth, when such a person meets a servant of God, that person will be able to put on the garment of righteousness.
You must prepare the wedding garment. What is the true garment? The true wedding garment is receiving the remission of sins in one’s heart. Receive the remission of sins that you have committed up until now. Also believe in the gospel of the water and the Spirit by which the Lord has completely forgiven all those sins that you will be committing in the future as well, once and for all. You must believe that the Lord absolved the sins of the world once and for all.
Are you wearing the garment in your hearts? Do you still have sins for not having put on the wedding garment in your hearts? Are you wearing fashionable clothes that you have made on your own accord? After hearing this sermon, I hope that you will take off your filthy clothes. Then, I hope for you to put on the clothes that the Lord has made for you. People who attend the King’s wedding feast wearing the true wedding garment are those who are without sin in their hearts.
Have you truly been born again? Jesus Christ says that unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he can neither enter nor see the Kingdom of God. Therefore, we must all be born again. We must be reborn. As long as you are born from the flesh of your parents, no matter how virtuously you live during your life, you will still have sins. Even though people try not to commit sins, sins still do exist in their hearts. That is why the Holy Spirit enters our hearts. We are reborn as those who are without a single sin only if we receive the remission of all those sins. We must be born again while we are still living in this world. Jesus Christ said that one can enter the Kingdom of God only by being born again.
Have you been born twice? Although the words may seem commonplace, you must really listen. Only when you are born again, do you get to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. If you haven’t been born again, no matter how many good deeds you do, you will go to a burning hell. There is no winter there. At least you will not have to worry about heating fuel cost. Dear fellow believers, you must receive the remission of sins. As you were born a human being, the most important thing that you must do is to be born again, and then go on living in this world. In a short while, the One who is to come will come. Even if that isn’t the case, in a short period of time, we ourselves will disappear form this world. With a short passing of time, 3/4 of us who are sitting here, will move on to the next world.
I still feel 18 years old in my heart, but people call me sir. When someone from the street calls me “sir,” I get to thinking, “Surely, that person isn’t calling me.” When my son calls me “Father, father” there are time when I cannot grasp the reality, and I think, ‘Well, I wonder if I am a father.” I got old like this without quite realizing it. When time passes fast like this, I will be facing the day when I have to go before God.
Dear fellow believers, we do not know when we will be putting a period on our life. We must be born again of water and the Spirit. Being born again refers to receiving the remission of sins. It is said, “Repent therefore and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord” (Acts 3:19). Anyone can have his or her sins blotted out. When invited by the King, all we have to do is to accept that invitation and the King will take complete responsibility for all of us who have accepted the invitation.
Because He had given the invitation, He will take the responsibility that we may enter His Son’s wedding feast, in order for us to become the bride of His Son. He will make us perfectly holy. The King’s Son is getting married. Would He allow His Son to marry a filthy bride? If a filthy bride were to ask, “Is this sufficient?” would her father-in-law say, “Good,” and commence with the ceremony? No. “My Son, this bride is too filthy. You go and clean her up first and then have the wedding.”
These words are very important. One cannot enter Heaven unholy. The king had said to bind the hands and feet of the filthy one and cast him into outer darkness for not having worn the wedding garment. This part is very important. If a person is born again, that person gets to go to Heaven. If a person is not born again, that person goes to hell. The garment stated here is the faith of believing in the true gospel. It isn’t that the garment has been prepared just because a person goes to church. One has to hear the gospel Word of the water and the Spirit from the born-again servants of God, the born-again brothers and sisters, in order to wear the wedding garment.
Those of you who want to be born again and do not know what to do; listen to the Word that leads you to be born again of the water and the Spirit. Ease your hearts completely and listen to the Word. The Word that leads you to be born again of water and the Spirit isn’t difficult. God the Father wishes in His heart to send us to Heaven. Do you think He would make the Word so difficult that we would not be able to understand it? He tells it so very plain. He tells us how Jesus has blotted out all our sins. Those who haven’t been born again, and still have sins, must listen to the gospel of the water and the Spirit by meeting the servants, brothers, or sisters who have received the remission of sins.
I think that the brain of a person who isn’t able to receive the remission of sins, despite having come to God’s Church, is no more than a rotten pumpkin. How low could an IQ be, to not be able to put on a garment that is so easy to put on? The Truth is very simple. We say that the molecular formula for water is H2O. But if were to try to define this more elaborately in a scientific way, there would be no end. If we were to take a sip of water and realize the property of water, we would say, “Ah, this is what water is.” Rather than hearing explanations hundreds of times and imagining one realizes it at once just by tasting it.
I hope that you receive the remission of sins. Neither you nor I know when we will be going to face God. If you don’t want to get cast out for being filthy in appearance, not having worn the wedding garment, then you must receive the remission of sins by believing in the gospel of the water and the Spirit.
Then, I pray that you will go on living having realized the proper way to live after having received the remission of sins, and what is it that the Truth is telling you. With the little time that we have left in our lives, I hope for you to go on living having realized what is the proper life for you. In order to prepare you with the wedding garment, do you realize just how much prayer your children, your friends, brothers and sisters of the Church, and God’s servants are offering? Do you think they are asking you to go to the Church together just in words? They are asking you, the parents, “Let’s go to the Church together,” because they are overjoyed that their hearts have changed and the Holy Spirit has come to reside in their hearts by the gospel of the water and the Spirit. They started to have faith in Jesus. Because of this, they have put on the wedding garment that will allow them to enter the Kingdom of Heaven.
How can one go to Heaven all alone? How can you leave behind your close friends and go by yourself? If the place I am heading for were awful, I would not wish that my friends and parents would follow me. I would rather suffer the misery alone and be done with it. But Heaven is a place that I want to force and drag them to because it is a place that I want to go together with them.
They have invited you because they are haunted by the images of you. They have come to love the Lord after having truly met Him. How can they go to such a great place by themselves? They are sick at heart thinking about going there alone with so many people left behind, including family members and friends. They couldn’t bear leaving their neighbors behind, like the little boy next door and his parents. I hope you realize their intention. Having received little education, we may speak coarsely, but the hearts of those of us who are the born-again are gentle and beautiful.
In order to present you with something precious, we are holding the discipleship training camp again this summer. Also, in order to find out the Truth in the Word of God, we are holding such a meeting semi-annually every year. Even in our last winter camp, there were people who came to the meeting and received the remission of sins. When they came, they said, “Oh no. I do not match up well with Jesus.” So, by gently appeasing them, I told them, “Please listen just a little bit. Please have a seat for a moment.”
After having listened for several hours, they started having some laughter come out from deep within their hearts. They said the laughter had slipped out unconsciously. The laughter that God gives comes from deep within us. As you are going to the bathroom, laughter slips out thinking, “For me to be without sin.” To a crawling maggot, you say, “Hello maggot, you don’t know you will become a fly, do you? My life was like yours, but after being born again like this, I am a child of God. My sins are gone. Wow. This is tremendous. Isn’t it? Do you know that? You don’t know, do you? If you were a human being, I would have told you.” a fellow believer, as you sit on a toilet seat, laughter comes out.
After having been born again, laughter will come out as you go to school and study. As you read books of this world, you find them very childish. Unlike before, studying moves along very well, because you think, “If I cannot understand as I study, I’ll just do away with it.” You will understand better than when you had been all hung up on it. It was something you just couldn’t understand in the past despite hard effort, but the book is easy when reading it after having received the remission of sins. Therefore, as you study, laughter comes out. As you chat with your friends, laughter comes out. As you go on an errand for your elder, laughter comes out. And, as you go on living in this world, laughter always comes out.
Is this being crazy? Am I crazy? After the Lord had clothed me with the wedding garment, the Holy Spirit entered my heart. After that, my life of faith became joyful. I didn’t know that a life of faith could be this easy. Now, I don’t need to shed tears everyday. “Dear Lord, please forgive me.” Tears do not flow. Yet, a man forces himself to think about the deaths of his grandmother or grandfather, and about times when he had suffered unfair treatment. He forces himself to weep as he thinks about Jesus getting nailed to the Cross. However, Jesus Christ said, “Do not weep for Me, but weep for yourselves and for your children.” In other words, He is saying to us, “You should cry for yourselves. If you do not receive the remission of sins, you will go to hell in the future. Thus, cry as you think about the burning place, and as you go to a house of mourning and weep, think about what you have to do in order to receive the remission of sin.”
I didn’t know that a life of faith could be this good. I didn’t know how good it was at first. But, I found that out later. “I didn’t know how good it was when I first had met you, but as we have been living together, I feel so very good.” Aren’t there married couples like that? There are couples that squeak a little in the beginning of the marriage, but then start to understand and cherish each other little by little. Such a marriage relationship is very good. Don’t you think being a married couple is very good? My spouse knows all my trespasses and I know all the trespasses of my spouse. Even if there are trespasses, they don’t become a problem. Is there any relationship that is as good as a married couple?
The Lord met with me once and He took care of all the problems. He guided me in the way of God’s righteousness, He allowed me to live for His righteousness, made me realize what is right, and gave me the strength to walk in the way of the righteousness. He gives me the strength so I can continue to live like that in the future. Do you know how blissful it is to be able to live an entire life doing righteous works while living in this world? A person goes on living, but if that person will be living a life for things that aren’t righteous, that life will only be cursed and toilsome. As long as we are living in this world, we must realize how blessed it is to know what is right, to carry that out, and to be able to live for it.
Try to meet the Lord. In the past, I tried so hard to meet the Lord. “Dear Lord! I believe that You will meet with me.” I also prayed a lot. But praying did not help. Although I had offered prayers of repentance for two or three days whenever I had committed a sin, no matter how hard I had tried, there was no refreshing feeling in my heart even though I was saying, “Dear Lord! I believe you have forgiven me for this sin.” With lips, I was saying, “I believe,” but the heart was saying, “I’m not sure. Did it really go away?” at times, I rebuked my heart saying, “You are my heart, yet why aren’t you staying on my side?” Even though I had said again and again, “Dear Lord, I believe. I believe in You,” there was no faith in my heart. My heart was as empty as ever, and it was in chaos.
But one day, our Lord taught me the gospel of the Truth through the Word. I did not have any trouble. I just saw and listened to the Word. Then, I examined it to see if the Word was really true or not. When I saw the Word once again, I realized that God has invited all people and that the Lord has already saved all people by the power of the gospel of the water and the Spirit. So He could say, “Whether a person is bad or good, go into the highways, and invite them all. Bring all of them.” Our Lord has completely blotted out all the sins of those who commit them. I found out that God had all the sins of the world blotted out by the water and the Spirit. Then He invited everyone to Heaven. I was one of those people who were invited. I received the remission of sins by believing in the gospel of the water and the Spirit.
Life after having received the remission of sins is as follows. Those who have sins cannot be somewhere and brag. Where would they go and brag? They are nothing but sinners. But the righteous are bold. The Lord says, “The wicked flee when no one pursues, but the righteous are bold as a lion” (Proverbs 28:1). It is because they have received the remission of sins through Jesus Christ. They have been born again through Jesus Christ. They have the faith that they will go to Heaven, and because of this, they are very bold. Those who believe in the gospel of the water and the Spirit are those who go to Heaven only because of the power of the gospel. And through Jesus Christ, only the righteous have the special privilege of becoming a child of God. In the future, this world will disappear, but there will be new a heaven and a new earth (2 Peter 3:13). That place is yours and mine; those of us who have received the remission of sins. It belongs to those of us who have become children of God. In a short while, we will go to that Kingdom. We are the masters of that Kingdom.
Do you think that a master would lead a worthless life in this world? No. They are so brave as to say there is no life more valuable than this. They go on leading a righteous life for the benefit of others’ souls. The work that we, the born-again do, is a work that is of great value, from beginning to end. We have become a high and a noble people.
Dear fellow believers, have you received the remission of sins? If there are those of you who haven’t received the remission of sins, I pray that you receive the remission of sins right now. Do you want your life to be blissful? If so, then receive the remission of sins first. One has to think about the other things after having received the remission of sins.
After you have received the remission of sins, examine the Lord’s Word to see if they really are true, and then follow Him. At the last day, I pray that you will all enter the Kingdom of Heaven wearing the garment with which God has clothed you. While you are still alive on this earth, I pray that you won’t miss out on the opportunity to become sons of God by accepting the invitation and receiving the remission of sins.
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