We Don’t Have The Correct Currency For Heaven

A description of our spiritual bankruptcy in the sight of God

 
This article is about our spiritual standing before a holy God. I am going to point out how we don’t have the correct “currency” in and of ourselves to purchase our own salvation, nor to even “help” or assist with paying for it. In Christianity, the word “gospel” means “good news” and that good news is that Jesus Christ died to save sinners, and He rose again 3 days later as He said He would, proving that He is the DIVINE SAVIOR that He claimed to be. But proclaiming God’s plan of salvation includes sharing the REASON for the NEED of the GOOD NEWS. That reason being that even on our best days, we are all hell-deserving sinners in the eyes of a thrice-holy God.
 
Jesus did not leave His glory in Heaven to mocked, spit upon, brutally beaten and slaughtered on a wooden cross just to give us “the option” of Christianity. As God in the flesh, He offered up Himself as a human, yet divine sacrifice, since that was the ONLY WAY that God could have a people for Himself for all eternity, because, according to God’s system of justice, our sins need to be paid IN FULL in order to enter Heaven. And the only way that our sins could be paid IN FULL, is by the atoning death of the Lamb of God, the ONLY sacrifice for sin that God has declared will be a satisfactory atonement (payment) for sin that is ACCEPTABLE TO HIM. God doesn’t really care what you think is acceptable payment for your sins. It’s His Heaven. He’s God. He’s the rule maker for His eternal dwelling place. He, not you, gets to decide how a person is made fit for Heaven.
 

Please note the following statement of Jesus Christ where He uses the word “ransom”:
 
“For even the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a RANSOM for many.” Mark 10:45.
 
If you go to Mark chapter 10 in the Bible you will see that Jesus did not follow up that statement with “I only mean a partial ransom” or “But of course you’ve got to add your good deeds to my payment because my death won’t be sufficient to pay for ALL your sins”.

 
Since the main point of our discussion here hinges upon the word “ransom”, let us look at the Greek word that the English word “ransom” was translated from:

As we see, the Greek word is lutron (pronounced “loo-tron”) which has the meaning “to liberate many from misery and the penalty of their sins” as stated in the Strong’s Greek & Hebrew concordance of the Bible, the KJV Bible in this case. By the way, this exact same statement regarding Jesus being a “ransom for many” is found in Matthew Matthew 20:28 and the same Greek root word was used in the original Greek manuscripts.
 
We owe God a debt for our sin that we could never repay, that we could never even assist in paying. Basically, we don’t have the currency required in God’s economy to pay the ransom. We are totally bankrupt beggars in the sight of God, though we may not think so. Jesus and His perfect righteousness is the ONLY currency that God will accept, which is why Hebrews 2:3 says: “How shall we escape, if we neglect so great a salvation?”.
 
When a person becomes a true child of God, by being born of the Holy Spirit (which the Bible calls being “born again” or “born from above”), they go from being spiritually dead to being spiritually alive. And they go from being spiritually bankrupt to being spiritually wealthy beyond measure as noted here in Ephesians 1:7 by the use of the word “riches”:
 
“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ: According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love: Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved. In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the RICHES of his grace;” Ephesians 1:3-7
 
Whose currency are you counting on to get you to Heaven? God’s currency or are you still planning to use your own bankrupt currency to purchase your pardon from sin? God has a very unflattering view of our currency – our righteousness – when compared to the perfect righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ – as we see here:
 
“But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away.” Isaiah 64:6
 
The apostle Paul clearly stated whose righteousness is adequate to purchase a sinner’s salvation when he said:
 
“And be found in him, not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law [trying to earn salvation by keeping the “law”, the commandments], but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith.” Philippians 3:9
 
So now the question for YOU is: Are you STILL spiritually bankrupt? Or, have you received a full pardon, the FULL ransom payment, that God has provided through the Lord Jesus Christ? Are you willing to admit that you don’t have what it takes to get to Heaven, but Jesus absolutely has everything it takes? Are you wholly leaning on Him and His perfect righteousness for your ransom payment for sin, and for the redemption of your soul, from the eternal wrath of God? — RM Kane
 

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