The story of mankind, condensed:
God makes man
Man rebels to seek "the knowledge of good and evil"
God gives "the law", an explanation of good
Man rebels by failing to follow good
God gives Jesus, to cover that sin and thereby allow us to be good on His life, not ours.
The entire gospel is summed up in this verse, God pulls man back to the garden, to perfection, by giving Jesus to live the life we can't, and die the death we should, but don't have to.
Grace and truth come through Jesus, not the law, not religion. God lays a path down for us to walk back to him, without earning it ourselves. He knows we can't! He knows that we can never cover our own sin, our past, with goodness. We cannot earn forgiveness of our debt. It is real and we are bankrupt. We can convince ourselves otherwise, pretending to be wealthy, but we are still bankrupt.
Grace and truth say, it's ok. I forgive you now so that you can sin no more. While we are sinners, He forgives! That's grace. Through him we can sin no more, that's truth!
The law (religion, self help, will power, actions, good deeds, etc) can not save us. Grace and truth can. Jesus can. Only jesus can.
God makes man
Man rebels to seek "the knowledge of good and evil"
God gives "the law", an explanation of good
Man rebels by failing to follow good
God gives Jesus, to cover that sin and thereby allow us to be good on His life, not ours.
The entire gospel is summed up in this verse, God pulls man back to the garden, to perfection, by giving Jesus to live the life we can't, and die the death we should, but don't have to.
Grace and truth come through Jesus, not the law, not religion. God lays a path down for us to walk back to him, without earning it ourselves. He knows we can't! He knows that we can never cover our own sin, our past, with goodness. We cannot earn forgiveness of our debt. It is real and we are bankrupt. We can convince ourselves otherwise, pretending to be wealthy, but we are still bankrupt.
Grace and truth say, it's ok. I forgive you now so that you can sin no more. While we are sinners, He forgives! That's grace. Through him we can sin no more, that's truth!
The law (religion, self help, will power, actions, good deeds, etc) can not save us. Grace and truth can. Jesus can. Only jesus can.
