God chose Israel, the Jews, and Jesus to show His unworldly love and power to all people. All worldly things are against God and multiply fast. God desires that everyone choose Him and be eternally with Him, but heaven cannot be ours if God is not our focus when we die or Jesus returns.

The Bible says everyone, Jew and Gentile alike, is accountable to Jesus. Jesus, the righteous judge, will judge everyone upon death or when He returns. We know, and are known, by Jesus, and turn to Him in repentance after sinning and we are forgiven, or else we remain in our sin.

Being forgiven does not make our wrongs right, nor does it take away the consequences of sins, but forgiveness provides opportunity for personal growth. God’s forgiveness allows us to remain within God’s family and provides opportunity for the Holy Spirit to work on our spirits.

In divine justice, the repentant heart is atoned for and found not guilty whereas the willfully unrepentant heart remains guilty and must receive retribution. Wrongs must be dealt with in a just society. God, the epitome of a perfectly just society, ensures that there are no mistrials.

Most people understand how sin hurts victims, their families, and friends, and, also, how it hurts perpetrators, their friends, families, and other involved parties. The most profound consequences of sins, for Christians, are spiritual, especially when sinners counter God through disobedience.

People develop habits from an incredibly early age. They learn them from their families or later at school or work. Good habits generally improve life while bad habits degrade and shorten life. Once entrenched, habits are difficult to break. Sins too easily become habitual and are difficult to overcome but for God. Psychologists and twelve step programs help people control their harmful behaviors but God, who defines many bad behaviors as sins, uses His divine justice to treat sin.

Those who are guilty and caught off guard when Jesus returns will be at His mercy and will be held accountable for all sins that have not been redeemed or atoned for by Jesus. God is neither cruel or judgmental, but He is the beginning and ending of all things. What God deems as right is right, and it supports life. What God deems as evil is evil, and evil supports death. God is perfectly just and His justice is perfectly righteous.

What, then, does God expect of Christ’s followers in terms of sin, and how does He want us to live? The answers are clear in the Bible and through Jesus’s life. These teachings are difficult to uphold because they oppose the world which rails against those who uphold God and His Word. But God directs us to uphold His laws through modeling Jesus’s life and teachings.

Jesus stood with those who faithfully stood with Him and His teachings. Jesus is perfect love, justice, and obedience. Everyone, regardless of ability, birthplace, color, ethnicity, nationality, and sex, has equal standing before God. All are free in God’s eyes and not a slave to anyone.

Worldly things (such as beauty and strength, power and popularity, and good works) carry no value in God’s economy. Some Christians place importance on things that do not matter to God. They are good at making mountains out of mole hills, especially regarding the things that others may do wrong, but which God does not see as sinful. God knows our hearts and separates what matters from what damages and kills the human spirit, those things which draw people away from Him and His goodness.

Christians are not perfect. They sin, but if they relate with God in prayer and Bible reading, they know that their sin must be repented of and turned from, because if not, sin will kill their spirits and relationships with others. If not dealt with, sin suffocates human spirits to the extent that they no longer can feel their consciences twinge when they sin. Most serious of all is how sin kills the relationship between human spirits and God. It kills affinity with God for His creation.

Christians focus on Jesus because Christlikeness is the goal of their faith. When they sin, they are convicted of how they hurt others and God, and they want to set things right. If their sin becomes habitual, faithful Christians will seek out wise counsel to help them return to God in the power of the Holy Spirit. God’s love and mercy will help them refocus on Christ and turn from their evil. Despite wanton efforts to distort its veracity, the Bible is our best resource on most things.

A Christian is always loving even when in disagreement. Sometimes the best thing that can be said is nothing. It is better to be silent than to lie or say things in anger. Today, much is stretched and embellished to the point that it no longer resembles the truth. The less said, the less there is to misunderstand. No one knows everything. When we do not know, we admit we do not know.

The most important thing that Christians know is that they are God’s children and one day they will inhabit a perfect world free of sin. Until then they will persevere the world’s ways and live lovingly in truth as Jesus did. Because they know and are known by God, Christians reciprocate God’s perfect love to Him and to other people because Jesus, their model, is also their focus.