AIDS: Consider the Big Picture

AIDS is a terminal disease. However, death is not the end of life; it is a door to eternal life. (with prayer)

AIDS... Even if you're not in a "high risk" group, your life may be affected. Consider these facts:

Fact 1 -- AIDS is transmitted through the exchange of fluids in intimate sexual contact or in shared drug usage with an infected person, gay or straight.

Fact 2 -- It only takes one such encounter with an AIDS carrier to contract the virus. The carrier may not even know if he (or she) is infected.

These facts have already caused millions of Americans to reconsider their sexual behavior. For thousands who are already infected with the AIDS virus it may be too late. No cure has been found.

But consider the big picture. There is a greater problem in which each of us is in the high risk group. It is an incurable condition that you and I have lived with from the moment we were born. AIDS is only one of the possible terminal stages. The mortality rate is 100%.

Despite the progress of modern science, death is still the inescapable last fact of life. None of us is immune, whether we're 19 or 95. We never know when or where death will strike. We buy insurance against it coming unexpectedly. We padlock and seatbelt against it coming violently. We pretend it will never catch up with us. But whether from AIDS or old age, we all will die. These are the facts.

But there is hope. There is life after death, life free from the killjoys of sin that infect the earth. Selfishness, hatred, disease and death itself will all be gone.

Death is not the end of life; it is a door to eternal life. Jesus Christ has suffered the agonies of death for you and me. He has taken the penalty for sin that you and I deserved and has opened wide the forgiveness of God's love.

Without Christ we face judgment and the awesome prospect of eternity separated from God. The Bible says, "The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord" (Romans 6:23).

God's offer of eternal life is free. We can't pay for our sins by living a "good" life. He's not impressed with the quality of our good deeds. Is our love perfect? Are our thoughts and actions always pure? Of course not. Our very best efforts are tarnished by sin.

God is different. He is absolutely pure and loving and just and holy. Just as a judge must punish crime, so God must judge sin. Nothing but the willing sacrifice of His blameless Son can pardon us so that we can stand in God's presence.

Have you received God's pardon through Jesus Christ? Why not pray to Him now: "Lord, I realize that there is nothing I can do to be pure enough to stand in Your presence. I ask Jesus Christ to come into my life to make me pleasing to You. Thank You that He died for me so that I can live with You forever."

© 2002 Good News Publishers. Used by permission.
Translated by permission of Good News Publishers
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