New Christian Self Study Course
For People Who Have Recently Accepted Jesus As Their Savior
Tom & Mari Anne Street
Members of Trinity Baptist Church
8421 Meadow Road S. W.
Lakewood, Washington 98499
253-584-8856 www.trinitybaptistchurchlakewood.org
Acknowledgements:
Our Pastor David B. Young and our friends at Trinity Baptist Church.
The Most Important Single Event In Your Life
This booklet is for people who have recently asked Jesus to save them from their sins or people who are searching for salvation. You may have repeated a prayer prompted by a friend or minister, and did not fully know about God and Jesus to whom you prayed. If you have accepted Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, it was the single most important thing you have done in your life. This will determine how you will live the rest of your life and where you will spend eternity after you die. If you have not made this decision yet, I pray you will accept Jesus Christ as your personal savior today. Life goes by quickly and you do not know for sure if you will be alive tomorrow. The Bible says today is the day of salvation. If you have genuinely accepted Jesus as your personal savior, you are born again and God will accept you into heaven when you die. Heaven is a wonderful place prepared for us.
I have seen people through the years pray the sinner's prayer and walk away without any change in their life. Some may act like a Christian for a few months and then they go back to their old life. Satan was waiting to attack them. You will need the word of God to fight Satan when he attacks you. He does not want you to become a Christian and if you do, he will try to keep you from serving God. I Peter 5:8 says, “Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour.”
Jesus spoke about this problem when he was on earth in a story about a farmer who sowed some seeds hoping they would grow and be healthy plants. Some of the seeds fell by the way side and birds came and ate them. Some fell on hard rocky places and could not take root, so they died. Some seeds fell on thorns and were choked. However some fell upon good soil and the roots grew deep. Good healthy plants came up. The seed is the Word of God which needs to be planted deep in your heart and watered so you will have a great life with Jesus.
There are some very important beliefs you need to understand so you will know for sure who you are worshiping. These truths will help you get started and equip you so you can share your faith with others.
The Essential Beliefs You Need to Know
1. There is only one true God.
God the Father is a wonderful God who loves you and is personally interested in you. God the Father is the head of what we call the Trinity (God the Father, God the Son (Jesus) and God the Holy Spirit). The Trinity is hard to understand with our small human minds. There is one God in three persons. Not three different Gods. The word “persons” is a human term to show they have a relationship with each other. They have distinct and separate functions and individual attributes. God the Father loved you so much he sent his son Jesus to earth to die for your sins. Read John 3:16. When Jesus was on earth he prayed to God the Father and did his will. After Jesus died and was resurrected from the dead, he returned to heaven with God the Father and sent the Holy Spirit back to earth to direct our life and comfort us. Why God loves us that much is the greatest life mystery, but he does. He could have made you like a robot and programmed you to love him, but he wanted you to love him because you want to love him. I would not want to put a computer chip in the head of my wife and program her to love me. I want her to have the freedom to love me because she wants to love me. God has given all of us the freedom to love or reject him.
2. Who is God the Son, Jesus Christ?
He has always been with God the Father. The Bible tells us that Jesus was with the Father during the creation (Read John 1: 1-4. Jesus was the Word in these Bible verses). Jesus was not created like the angels and other heavenly beings. He was not the brother of Lucifer as the Mormons believe or Michael the Archangel as the Jehovah Witnesses believe. He was not just a prophet as many other religions believe. Jesus was God the Son. Jesus allowed himself to come to earth as a man and allowed himself be put to death like a common criminal to pay the price for our sins. God the Father will not allow sin to enter heaven. Man could not do enough good works to pay for his own sin, nor could anyone else pay the price. It took the blood of Jesus to pay for your sins so you can go to heaven when you die. Jesus was raised from the dead on the third day like he had predicted. His body was raised from the dead, not just his spirit as some religions believe. He appeared to over 500 people including his disciples. He was able to appear in a room in a physical body and was even able to eat in his resurrected body. Jesus is now on the right hand of God the Father. When you pray to God the Father in Jesus' name, God the Father hears your prayers. You cannot pray in Jesus' name unless you believe God the Father raised God the Son (Jesus) from the dead.
3. Who is God the Holy Spirit?
God the Holy Spirit is God. In the King James Version of the Bible he is called the Holy Ghost. Later versions of the Bible refer to him as the Holy Spirit. He is not an “it” or some type of force. Acts chapter 5 tells a story about Ananias and his wife Sapphira who lied about some money they had given. Peter said because they lied to the Holy Spirit, they lied to God. God the Holy Spirit came upon people for special purposes in the Old Testament days of the Bible. Forty days after Jesus went back to heaven, Jesus sent God the Holy Spirit upon the believers at Pentecost to stay with them. When you get saved, God the Holy Spirit comes into your heart. He is also called the Comforter. This is how God comforts and empowers you while you live on earth. (Read John 15:26 John 16:7-14.) One of the most important acts of the Holy Spirit was when He moved upon holy men to write the holy scriptures which we call the Holy Bible. (Read 2 Peter 1:4 and 2 Timothy 3:16). The reason you can trust the Bible as being the truth is because it was written by God through holy men.
4. How did Jesus become a man?
Jesus' birth was a miracle. God the Holy Spirit came upon a young virgin named Mary and Jesus was planted in her womb. (Read this wonderful story in Luke chapters one and two. ) Jesus had a human mother to make Jesus both man and God. He was 100 percent man and 100 percent God. He did not have a human father since he was born of a virgin. If this were not true, then Jesus would have only been a man and would not have the power to save you. This is one of the most important essential beliefs.
5. Why is the crucifixion important?
This is how Jesus paid the price for your sins. You could not be saved if Jesus did not die for you. When you pray the sinner's prayer, you are repenting of your sins and asking Jesus to cover your sins with the blood Jesus shed on the cross for you. It is God's will for everyone to be saved. There is no other way to come to God except through Jesus. (Read John 14:6, Jesus says he is the only way to God in this verse and Jesus cannot lie.) If being a good person could save you, then Jesus would not have had to come to earth and die. You may hear people say, all religions will get everyone to heaven. That is a lie of Satan and calls Jesus a liar.
6. Why is the Resurrection important?
If Jesus did not rise from the dead, then you are still dead in your sins. The resurrection is the most important event in the history of the world.
How Can A Person Go To Heaven?
After our first ancestors Adam and Eve sinned, sin separated the human race from God. God is holy and will not allow sin to come into heaven. God still loved man and wanted man to come back to him. So God sent his son Jesus to die and pay the penalty for the sins of humans, so you can have forgiveness and eternal life. (Read John 3: 3-4)
1- First you have to admit you are a sinner. This can be hard for some people to admit. It is the job of God the Holy Spirit to convict you of your sins and draw you to Jesus. Some people may feel bad for bad things they have done, but refuse to repent and ask God for forgiveness. (Read Romans 3:23)
2- You have to repent of your sins and turn away from your sins by the power of the Holy Spirit.
3- You need to ask God to save you by the power of the blood of Jesus Christ which he shed on the cross for your sins. (John 3:16)
4- You must confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus Christ and believe in your heart that God the Father raised Jesus from the dead and you will be saved. (Romans 10: 9-11 and Acts 2: 21)
If you have not yet accepted Jesus as your savior, pray to God now admitting that you are a sinner and ask God to forgive you of your sins and believe in your heart that Jesus died for your sins. This is what some call the “sinner's prayer.”
True / False Test (Circle the correct answer)
1- All good people go to heaven.
True False
2- God the Father loved us so much, he sent his son Jesus Christ to die for our sins.
True False
3-Jesus was only a good man and a prophet.
True False
4-It does not matter what religion you believe in, just as long as you are serious since all religions lead to the true God.
True False
5- Jesus is the only way to God.
True False
6- Jesus was a created being like angels.
True False
7- Jesus is God.
True False.
8- The Holy Spirit is God and is part of the Trinity with God the Father and God the Son.
True False
9- Jesus' mother was named Mary and she was a virgin when Jesus was born.
True False
10- Jesus did not have to die to save us. He could have just been a prophet and told people how to live a good life in order to be saved.
True False
Answers to the true / false questions.
1- False 2- True 3- False 4- False 5- True 6- False 7-True 8- True 9- True 10- False
Questions You May Have
Q. How do I know there is a God?
A. Have you ever looked up at the sky at night and viewed all the stars and distant galaxies knowing that our earth is in the exact position to sustain life? If we were a little closer to the sun it would be too hot to live on earth and a little further we would freeze. Have you been on a mountain top and looked at the beauty of the mountains, deserts, forests, rivers, and oceans? Have you ever turned over a rock in your back yard and watched small insects running around doing their business? Have you looked at a new born baby and not wondered how something this perfect could be an accident or a freak of nature? Only a fool can look at nature and not know it was designed by someone more powerful and more intelligent than anyone or anything you can imagine. This had to have been created by a very powerful God. (Read Genesis chapter one). If God is that powerful, then he is powerful enough to know everything about you and is able to hear your prayers and care about you. Psalms 40:17.
Q. Can I lose my salvation?
A. When Jesus gave you eternal life, it began when you were saved. You became a child of God. When you sin after you are saved, you will need to confess your sins as soon as possible to keep your fellowship with God. When you sin God will correct you like an earthly father correcting his children, but he does not disown you. (Read John 6: 37-40 and I John 1: 8-10 where John is writing to Christians.)
Q. Should I be baptized?
A. Now that you have believed in Jesus, you can be baptized as a testimony of what you believe and what God has done in you. Baptism is a public profession of your faith and in obedience to Jesus. Since baptism is for believers only, one should be old enough to make this decision prior to being baptized. Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist before he started his public ministry and he commanded his disciples to go through the world teaching and baptizing new believers in the name of the Father, and the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. (Read Jesus' words in Matthew 28: 19-20). You should discuss this with your pastor.
Q. Do I need to attend church?
A. Jesus established the Christian church and all believers should attend church regularly in order to worship God, learn about the Bible, and have fellowship with other believers. Christians seem to stray away from God when they neglect attending church.
What do I need to do now?
In order to grow as a Christian you will need to:
1- Find a certain time to pray and read at least one chapter of the Bible every day. You would not go a day without eating food: you should not go a day without feeding your soul on God's word. I suggest you start reading the book of John. John will give you a good foundation of the gospel.
2- Find a good church which believes in the same essential truths found in this booklet. Ask the pastor if they have a new Christian Bible study group to help you grow in Christ?
3. Share your new faith with your family and friends.
4. If you are truly saved, ask the church pastor to baptize you.
5. Open up your heart and learn more about God and ask God what you can do to serve Him. God has a plan for you.
Very important: If you are a young person who will be going to college soon, you need to know that there are a lot of ungodly professors who devote their life trying to disprove God to young students. This is w hy you need to have the word of God planted deep in your heart and prepare yourself to not allow these evil people to plant lies in your heart and take away your walk with Christ.
I pray the Holy Spirit will guide you in your new life in Christ.