Is there a difference in giving up your life and giving your life? Yes.
Jesus did not give up His Life. He gave His Life.
Jesus gave His Life for our sins, just as God our Father planned, in order to rescue us from this evil world in which we live.
Galatians 1:4
God revealed Himself through Jesus. He gave us The Life of Jesus so we could understand how to live Life with our Father God now and forever.
Jesus came not to condemn us, but to save us from living a life that would doom us to misery on earth. He came to save us from satan, who lies to us and makes us feel condemned.
Jesus described satan this way.
He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies.
John 8:44
Why did Jesus come?
The devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil.
1 John 3:8
For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him.
John 3:17
God wanted to save us from sin by showing us how to avoid it. He also wanted to teach us about Love, Mercy and Grace.
He did this, not to just give us a free pass to Heaven one day, but to show us how to live now and see Heaven on earth.
Your Kingdom come on earth as it is in Heaven.
Matthew 6:10
He came to bring us Life to the full and Complete Joy here and now.
I have come that they may have Life, and have it to the full.
John 10:10
I have told you this so that My Joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.
John 15:11
In Jesus, God showed us The Way.
He told us The Real Truth about Himself and each other.
God gave us His Life as Jesus to show us how to live knowing He is alive inside us.
I AM The Way and The Truth and The Life!
John 14:6
I AM in you and you are in Me!
John 14:20
For many, The Easter Story has become all about Jesus’ Death instead of His Life.
Jesus did not give up His Life. He gave His Life!
Satan would like us to forget Jesus’ Life. Satan would like us to concentrate on Jesus’ Death, especially what he, satan, thought was going to be a really Good Friday.
Satan would like us to skip over most of Jesus’ Life. He would like us to focus more on some of his, satan’s specialties like betrayal, denial, unfair trials, humiliation, torture, topped off by an agonizing death.
He would like us to forget that part about Jesus coming not to condemn, but to save.
Satan had big dreams and he would like us to be a part of them. He retells the story his way again and again, even now hoping to get milage from what was a stunning defeat for him.
We will next look further at how Jesus gave us His Life.
I am The Living One; I was dead, and now look, I am alive for ever and ever! Revelation 1:18
