It Is Finished

I can’t even begin to express the number of times I’ve heard discussions about how a person feels they aren’t good enough for God.  How they haven’t done enough and how their nature hasn’t changed enough to be worthy of salvation.  I think one of the greatest examples of how this kind of thinking is wrong comes at Easter. 
Jesus died on the cross with two other criminals being crucified on either side of him.  One of them asked Jesus to “remember him when He came into his Kingdom.”  Do you remember that part?  Pay attention now.  Jesus told this bad guy who was a slimeball who deserved his punishment in an earthly sense, that “Today you shall be with me in paradise.”  This is so very important to understand.  This guy didn’t say the ‘magic salvation prayer, he wasn’t baptized, and he didn’t put 10% in an offering plate for 40 years.  All he did was ask Jesus to remember him (actual usage of the word in the original text means “deliver”) when Jesus came into His Kingdom.  The fact is you die to your old nature at salvation (which is the moment you accept Christ.)  You will continue to struggle as a Christian if you think you have to prove yourself to God.  You don’t have to keep dying, beating yourself up and saying you are not good enough.  Christ did it for you.  It is already done and it isn't something God expects you to do; it's something He expects you to believe and accept (and that includes the days you get up and wonder, is all this really true?  Remember, this is a faith journey…we can’t prove God, but we can make rational choices to believe.)  
What have you got to lose…except maybe eternity?