In the Bible it says:  If we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins, and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.   If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.  (1 John 1:9-12)

So there is something to admitting we all are sinners and getting right with God. God is holy, we are sinners.  So one of the preparations for prayer is getting right with God.

God created us to express Him and God created us to represent Him on this earth.  How does man do this? Can man do it on his own? Do you think you and I can express God on our own? For instance God is love. The Bible tells us that God is love. Is there somebody in this universe that you can’t love? I have trouble with this sometimes. I sometimes find myself incapable of loving certain people. What is this? This is like a defect in me. I sometimes have an inability to express God.  The Bible has a good word to describe this problem that keeps us from experiencing God and from expressing God. This word is called sin.  Paul gives us an excellent definition of sin. Paul says “We all have sinned and fallen short of God’s glory”. Now what is God’s glory? This passage says we are missing out on, or have fallen short of God’s glory. This means what? God’s glory is simply the expression of God.  We have all sinned and fallen short of expressing God or expressing God’s purpose for us.  For instance, when your automobile is not functioning properly, when it’s not a vehicle suited for travel, you become frustrated.  You wish you could go someplace. You’re going to be late for work and you’re going to have to pay money to get it fixed.  It’s a big hassle and it becomes a big frustration for you. In the same way, when we are not functioning properly we become frustrated and unhappy. When we can’t love someone because we’re depressed and we’re just out of it, we are not happy. You could say we are broken down. God has a provision for this problem. God has a provision for sin. By the way, sin does not just mean doing something evil or bad.  That is normally what we think of when we think of sin. Yes, it includes that, but sin encompasses more than being bad or evil. Sin encompasses the inability in us to express God. Sometimes we just can’t do it. We’re depressed. We’re out of it. We just can’t love somebody.

God’s Provision for the Sin Problem 

What is God’s answer to this problem? What’s God’s answer to this dilemma? God knew sin was going to be a problem for man. So what did God do? Well, God has an answer. God has made provision for this sin problem. God’s answer is Jesus Christ. Who is Jesus Christ? I’m sure you’ve heard about Him. Maybe you’ve gone to church and read Bible stories about Him.  Maybe you know He’s a historical figure who lived about 2000 years ago.  But who is this Jesus? We need to see some very definite points concerning who Jesus is. First of all we’re going to make a diagram on the board here. And the first point we want to see is that Jesus is God. At the very top of our diagram we have God.  God is up in the heavens.  The Bible tells us that God didn’t just stay up in the heavens but He also became a man.  He came down to the earth and became a man. That means Jesus is not only fully God but also fully man. He didn’t just became man for five minutes and tell us a few do’s and don’ts, tell us to do the best  we can, and then take off back to heaven!  He came to us a babe, grew to be a child, then a teenager, and finally an adult.  Jesus had a short three-year ministry at the end of His life.  He was here for about 33 years. Then at the end of that life He did something very interesting. He died on the cross. So we’ll draw a cross here. Now why did Jesus die on the cross?  Jesus died on the cross in order to deal with every negative thing in this universe, including the problem of sin, including the problem of our inability to do what we know we should do, including our problem of not being able to express God, including the problem of the devil, and including the problem of sickness. Jesus on the cross dealt with many negative things—even more beyond what I already told you. Then, after three days, as He promised, He rose from the dead. He was resurrected.  Why did Jesus rise from the dead? Was it just so we could have Easter? Well, I think it’s more then that.  Jesus rose from the dead to be able to impart into us His resurrected life. That is the life of God that passed through death.  Jesus went into death and came out into resurrection. You know when we’re down or depressed or just out of it, sometimes we are really frustrated and do not know what to do.  The strongest negative thing that can happen to any human being is death. You may not have time or ability or resources to do something and you might be frustrated, but once you’re dead you have total inability. Our Jesus passed through death into resurrection and He wants to impart into us His resurrection life. That is the life of God that can pass through death.

After He rose from the dead He also ascended, and when He ascended He became Lord and Christ.  He became Lord of lords and King of kings. This Jesus Who is God, Who is man, Who died on the cross and rose from the dead, is now Lord of Lords. You could say He has the highest management position, or He has attainted the highest executive position in the entire universe! Then as He promised, He didn’t just stay there in the heavens but He got poured out as the Spirit. The Bible says He became the life-giving Spirit. Why did He become the life-giving spirit?  He became the life-giving spirit so He could get into our spirit.  Jesus is fully God and fully man, lived on this on earth for 33 years. I am sure that while He lived on the earth He passed through many frustrating situations. I’m sure there were times He wanted to lose His temper but He lived a perfect human life. He died on the cross. He rose and He ascended, and became the Spirit to get into our spirit. This is how God solves the problem of sin.