​Why God and Jesus engage mankind differently!

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What is God’s Will     for mankind?
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• ​[Genesis 6:5-8] So grieved by mankind’s harm toward one another, God saved Noah’s family to restart humanity after the Flood.
• [Genesis 37:28] In one example of harm... Jacob’s sons sell their own brother into slavery.  God intervened and Joseph became the Egyptian Visor.  Joseph later saved Jacob and his brother’s families from famine... by offering them hospitality in Egypt. 
• [Exodus 24:3] Many Pharaohs over 400 years turned hospitality into bondage. Jacob’s descendants cried out, so God raised Moses to save them and offered a Covenant or contract of 10 moral and spiritual behaviors... they agreed to live by.  
• [Deuteronomy 5:1] Moses said to all Israel: “Hear, O Israel, the statutes and judgments which I speak today, that you may learn them and be careful to observe them.   But each succeeding generation drifted further from the Covenant. 
•  [Judges 6-8:32] Israelite behavior increasingly grieved God.  God adopted a structured approach for disciplining God’s people:

1.  God’s beloved children violated the Covenant,
2.  God disciplined His people,
3.  God’s people cried out,
4. God raised a Judge to restore Covenant living.

• Each time behavior declined... another cycle of Judges repeated, as God became increasingly frustrated. 
• [Micah 6:8]  God's desire for mankind was made simple as possible: every human should act with justice and compassion toward one another, and every human should act with gratitude and humility toward God!
• [Hosea 13] The cycle of Judges failed to achieve lasting change, so God sent prophets to warn the northern kingdom of Israel... their moral treatment toward one another and their spiritual corruption toward God... is wholly unacceptable.  Israel failed to make an immediate and lasting change, so they perished.
• [Isaiah 1] God sent prophets to warn the southern kingdom of Judah... whose moral and spiritual corruption became even worse than Israel.  Failing to make an immediate and lasting change, so God’s protection was removed and Judah also perished 2600-years-ago.
• [Jeremiah 31:31] The old Covenant failed to achieve God’s Will for people living in community, so mankind was condemned, and God announced a New Covenant is coming, unlike God's failed Covenant with Israel and Judah.​

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​Why Jesus engages  
mankind differently!  

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• [John 3:16-17] Although God condemned mankind to perish, God still loved the world so much that 600 years later God sent His Son to institute this New Covenant 
  so the world might be saved.
  ​God’s New Covenant with mankind provides that whoever truly accepts Jesus as their personal Savior... will not perish... but will receive everlasting life.
• [John 5: 24] Jesus went on to say, those who hear My words and believe in Him who sent Me... 
  has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but pass directly from death into their new life.
• [Luke 22:20] At his Last Supper with the disciples,
  Jesus affirmed: This cup represents God’s New Covenant in My blood, which I shed for sinners. 
• [John 5: 22] Since the former Covenant failed to achieve God’s desired behavior, under the New Covenant the Father transfers responsibility to Jesus, the Son... for all judgment... including complete authority over demons, disease, and nature. 
• [Matthew 25:31-32] Then the Son chooses to delay all judgment until His return... when skeptics, doubters and agnostics will gather to learn their eternal reward...
  the fires of hell... or God’s Kingdom.
•  [Matthew 25:40] The judgment for those who comforted and served the least among us will hear:
  you also come, inherit God’s kingdom. 
• [Matthew 25: 41-42] The judgment for those who failed to help the least of Jesus’ brethren... will hear:
  ‘Depart from Me, you cursed, into the everlasting fire: for I was hungry and you gave Me no food; thirsty and you gave Me no drink; a stranger and you did not take Me in, naked and you did not clothe Me, sick and in prison and you did not visit Me.
• [Mark 16: 14-20] And yet... with grace upon grace... there is still a chance for those we care about who have not yet received Jesus as their personal Savior.  
  We believers are currently Commissioned to invite skeptics into a closer personal relationship with Jesus, recognizing that perishing souls often need more than a few invitations... before truly receiving Jesus as their Savior.  Like the blind man Jesus healed, none of us need to know scripture or theology, we need only humbly share what Jesus has done for us.  
• Therefore, God’s Will for everyone living in community: is to live in harmony... with dignity, compassion, and kindness for one another; and accept Jesus, the Son of God, as their Savior.    While this gift of eternal life cost Jesus everything, our price to receive eternal life... is sincerely believing Jesus is our personal Savior .