John 17: 3

“This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.”

Do you want eternal life? Well, here Jesus gives us the recipe for life eternal. It is knowing God and knowing Jesus Christ. Eternal life is not in knowing about God, it is knowing Him personally. Think about that for a moment. There are many people who know a lot about God who will not get to enjoy eternity with Him. There are people who have studied the Bible thoroughly just so they can argue against Him and Christianity. Those people know a lot about God but they will not attain to eternal life. Eternal life comes through a relationship with God and with His son, Jesus Christ. 

Those who do not know God will endure eternal death. What do suppose eternal death to be? It is separation from God. God is love and all life is in Jesus so those who are separated from them will endure eternity without love or life. And did you know that Jesus endured this death for us so that we would never have to taste it? This is the real price that Jesus paid for us. For some period of time he was actually separated from God and that was hell. Do you remember when Jesus cried out, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” (Mark 15: 34)  God separated Himself from Jesus when the sin of the world came to rest on Jesus. Look at the Amplified Version’s rendition of this verse, “And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?—which means, My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me [deserting Me and leaving Me helpless and abandoned]?” How horrific that must have been for Jesus. Never in his entire life had he spent a single moment outside of God’s presence. I am sure it was the most horrible kind of suffering and death that one could ever be put to.

We think of Jesus’ beatings and crucifixion as the high price that he paid but those were trivial in comparison to the real price of being separated from his father. Jesus was not afraid of anything anyone could do to his body. He gave us that insight in Matthew 10: 28 when he said, “Do not fear those who kill the body but are unable to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.” This was a foretelling of the death he would die. He knew he would go to hell in our place and he knew that to be the true death. He was taken out of his relationship with his father and made to stand in our place where sin separated us from the love of God. But Jesus suffered that hell for us and came out with victory over death and the keys to hell in his hand.

To know God is to know love but it is also the source of eternal life. We are to seek a personal relationship with our father and through that intimate association we gain abundant life and eternity with God. Get to know God and reap great rewards.