What Jesus Means to Me
April 2, 2019
One of the assignments in the bible class I am taking was to answer this question: “What does Jesus mean to me?” Here is my response to that question.
In my observation, truly successful missionaries are those that live among the people they are trying to reach with the gospel. They live in the same kind of lodgings, eat the same kind of food, and often do the same work the people do. It seems to powerfully speak to people when someone is willing to set aside their life and comforts to dwell with them for a season, to get to know them, to understand their situation, and to love them in the conditions that they are found in.
In putting on humanity, Jesus lived among the people. He was sent by God to the human race to reveal the love of the Creator. He walked the life we walk - the pain, the hunger, and the fear of death. He lived among us and taught us about the Father, healed the sick, raised the dead, obeyed the Father’s commandments. He told us the good news that the Creator was a loving God and a loving Father.
And after He revealed the Father through His example, He took one more step. He redeemed us. He went to the cross and died both spiritually and physically to pay the penalty for our sins. When He rose from the dead, He gave us the ability to gain a reborn human spirit. Death has no grip on us now; we are eternal beings when we accept Jesus.
The Creator loves man. This was the message of Jesus’ earthly ministry. Jesus’ death and resurrection tells us how important it was to Father God to have a restored relationship with man. John 3:16 states this importance so perfectly.
16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
This is an everlasting or eternal life with the Father. We were redeemed by the death and resurrection of Jesus so we could have eternal life. This is not just victory over death, but also bestows on us, right now, the power of God, through the Holy Spirit. It is working in our current life.
E.W. Kenyon wrote in Chapter 19 of The Bible in the Light of Our Redemption that natural man desires three things:
1) Fellowship with God,
2) Possession of the Life of God, and
3) The Strength of God.
These three things are fulfilled in Jesus. Jesus won those things for me and for all men.
1) Fellowship with God requires right standing with God. In Romans 3:24:
Yet God, in his grace, freely makes us right in his sight. He did this through Christ Jesus when he freed us from the penalty for our sins. (NLT)
So through Jesus we have fellowship with God as it says in Hebrews 4:16:
So let us come boldly to the very throne of God and stay there to receive his mercy and to find grace to help us in our times of need. (TLB)
2) Another desire of man is to possess of the Life of God. It says in Acts 17:28:
For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring. (KJV)
We have the light of God as stated in Colossians 1:13:
For He has rescued us and has drawn us to Himself from the dominion of darkness, and has transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son. (AMP)
3) Finally, man desires the Strength of God. In 2 Corinthians 12:9, Paul states:
But He has said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you [My lovingkindness and My mercy are more than enough—always available—regardless of the situation]; for [My] power is being perfected [and is completed and shows itself most effectively] in [your] weakness.” Therefore, I will all the more gladly boast in my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ [may completely enfold me and] may dwell in me. (AMP)
These three desires are fulfilled in Jesus. Jesus won those things for me and for all men. Life without these three things is futile.
When I sat down to make notes for this message, the first thought that came to my mind when I asked myself what Jesus means to me, was this: Life without Jesus is no life at all. It is simply a meaningless existence full of disappointments and defeat. Everything I did or tried to accomplish left me empty. No accomplishment could fill the hunger in me. I ached for a real relationship with God, even when I was deep, deep in rebellion. I wondered, what is the point of this life?
But my life changed when I submitted it to the Father by asking Jesus to take over my life. Everything I did before that surrender to Jesus was just dust. Paul put it so well in Philippians 3:7-8 when he said:
But whatever were gains to me I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. 8 What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them garbage, that I may gain Christ.
My life before Jesus was a constant struggle to accomplish, but it never satisfied. I know why now. Jesus stated it in John 15:5:
I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing.
For without me, you can do nothing. Nothing lasting or fulfilling. But, when I walked through the door of Jesus into the presence of the Father, when the Holy Spirit came to live inside of me, my life began. I am now a child of God and my life has meaning and purpose. What does Jesus mean to me? He means life. He means purpose. He means restoration to the fellowship with the Creator. Jesus declared in John 14:6:
…I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.
Jesus was declaring who He was. Jesus is the door to life. And that is what He means to me.
