Our life on Earth is only a blink compared to eternity. Your current circumstances, wealth, happiness and accomplishments, has no value when we die (Ecclesiastes 1:2-4), except your relationship with your eternal family (John 17:3; Ecclesiastes 12:13-14).

In the beginning...

The "LORD" (also known as Yahweh or Jehovah) God originally created our world to be very good (Genesis 1:31).

And the LORD God planted a garden in Eden, in the east, and there he put the man whom he had formed. And out of the ground the LORD God made to spring up every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. -- Genesis 2:8-9 (ESV)

God gave the humans the "Tree of life" which could have healed them (Revelation 22:2) so that they could have lived forever (Genesis 3) but the LORD GOD commanded:

“You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” -- Genesis 2:16-17 (ESV)

Unfortunately a fallen angel who envied God (Isaiah 14:12-15), decided to take his revenge on God's creation. He knew how much God loved the humans, therefore he decided to take revenge by tempting the humans to become disobedient to God. So he approached the woman as a "serpent" (Revelation 12:9):

He (the serpent) said to the woman, “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?”
And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, but God said, You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.’”
But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate.

-- Genesis 3:1-6 (ESV)

The deceived woman (1 Timothy 2:14) then also gave the fruit to her husband (Genesis 3:6), Adam, who choose to rather obey his wife than God (Genesis 3:17).

The penalty (curse) for this sin were pain (Genesis 3:16), hard labour (Genesis 3:17-19), and a limited lifespan (Genesis 3:19) which means death came to all humanity (Romans 5:12). These actions resulted that God had to remove humanity from the "Tree of life" to prevent evil to live forever (Genesis 3:22-24).

In the next chapter we read how the first child born on Earth was guilty of envy (Genesis 4:6), murder (Genesis 4:8) and lies (Genesis 4:9). Many years later the world was filled with so much evil the God had to reduce human's lifespan even more (Genesis 6:3-5).

That is why our current world is in such a bad shape. Although our ancestors ruined it for us, but we too are also guilty (Romans 3:23) of selfish desires and like out ancestors we will continue to sin so that our children will also inherit our iniquities (Psalm 51:5).

Although the penalty for sin is death (Romans 6:23), the LORD God said:

“I have no pleasure in the death of one who dies.” -- Ezekiel 18:32, 33:11

We read in the Torah (Old Testament) how that the Israelites had a law that required animals sacrifices to pay for their own sins (Leviticus 16:11-16). But even the perfect rituals with the animals' death was not good enough to save us from sin.

There is hope

God gave His word which was confirmed by many prophecies that the Christ (also known as the "Messiah") would come to save humanity (1 Corinthians 15:21-22) from Adam's death.

This Christ was born as Jesus (also known as Yeshua). Jesus did not inherit Adam's sin, because his mother was a virgin (Luke 1:26-38) which means Jesus was not born from any defiled seed from any man. Instead, Jesus' father, is God Himself (Matthew 1:18; Galatians 4:4).

Unfortunately, during Jesus lifetime on Earth, many did not recognize Jesus as the Christ (John 4:25-26) because their expectation was the Jesus would be born as king, possibly expecting Jesus to free the Jews from the Roman Empire, but instead God chooses a carpenter to raise Jesus (Mark 6:3) so that Jesus could free the world from sin (John 3:16) with no political agenda (Matthew 22:21).

When Jesus grew up as an adult, he began to teach people about his Father. He taught us how much his Father loves us (1 John 4:16).

God's adoption

One of the most important things that Jesus taught, is that God wants to adopt us as His children (2 Corinthians 6:18, 1 John 3:1, John 1:12, Ephesians 1:3-12). In other words, God Almighty (Exodus 15:6), the LORD Most High God (Genesis 14:22; Psalm 7:17; Psalm 47:2) wants you to be your "Papa"! (Romans 8:15)

That means that the Son of God, who is also the "King of kings, Lord of lords" (1 Timothy 6:15; Revelation 1:5, 17:14, 19:16) wants to recognize you as his "brother" or "sister"! (Matthew 12:50, Romans 8:17)

Jesus' love

Unlike many earthly rival siblings, Jesus is very compassionate about people.

Jesus went throughout all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every affliction. -- Matthew 9:35 (ESV)

But Jesus Christ, did not only preach and serve his community.

Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God -- Ephesians 5:2 (ESV)

Jesus did this voluntarily and knew (Luke 9:22) that he would be killed (Hebrews 2:14) like the sacrificial animals in the Old Testament. Jesus even humbled himself (Philippians 2:8) by allowing his enemies to spit in his face, struck him, slap him (Matthew 26:67), put thorns on his head, mocked him (Matthew 27:29-31), drove nail into him (John 20:25-27), struck him on the head (Matthew 27:30), stripped him (Matthew 27:31), and tortured him in the most unthinkable ways (Matthew 27:35) until he died for your sins!

But Jesus did not stay in the grave (Matthew 28:1). God resurrected Jesus (Acts 2:22-24) and made him Lord over the creation (Matthew 28:18; Philippians 2:9-10). This allowed our Lord Jesus to ascend into heaven to be with God (1 Peter 3:22) and to prepare a place for us so that we could stay with Him (John 14:2-3).

Jesus did not abandon us, instead he allows God's Spirit to guide (John 16:5-15; Nehemiah 9:20; Psalm 143:10; Isaiah 11:2), teach (1 Corinthians 2:10,13) and help (John 14:16,26; John 15:26; John 16:7; Romans 8:26) us. God raises His adopted children through the Spirit to live in that standard of love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, goodness, faith, meekness, self-control (Galatians 5:16-25).

We ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. -- Romans 8:23-24 (ESV)

Your Future

Our Lord is preparing us for his Father, such that we can be part of his home where we can live as his brothers and sisters (Mark 3:34-35). This will be possible when his Father adopt you as His child (Romans 8:15) in His eternal family. He is not obligated to take you into His family, but because he loves you and offer you the free choice to accept Him as your Father (Psalm 103:8-13).

One day, when you die, your body will return to dust (Ecclesiastes 3:19-20) and your spirit will return to God (Ecclesiastes 12:7; 2 Corinthians 4:16-5:9).

There you will temporarily "sleep" (Job 14:10-15; Psalm 13:3; Daniel 12:2; Matthew 9:23-26; 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18) until you are resurrected in a new body (Daniel 12:2-3; 1 Corinthians 15:35-44).

But, you will have to appear before the judgement-seat of the Christ (2 Corinthians 5:10).

• Will He acknowledge you before his Father?
• Will He deny you before his Father?

(Matthew 10:28-33, 25:31-46; Hebrews 9:27-28)

God's word either gives eternal life or eternal condemnation (John 12:44-50; Revelation 20:12-15).

That is why you need to be saved from your sins.

But...

Are you saved?

When the people heard this, they were deeply troubled and said to Peter and the other apostles, “What shall we do, brothers?”

Peter said to them, “Each one of you must turn away from your sins and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ, so that your sins will be forgiven;

and you will receive God's gift, the Holy Spirit. For God's promise was made to you and your children, and to all who are far away — all whom the Lord our God calls to himself.”

Peter made his appeal to them and with many other words he urged them, saying, “Save yourselves from the punishment coming on this wicked people!” Many of them believed his message and were baptized, and about three thousand people were added to the group that day. They spent their time in learning from the apostles, taking part in the fellowship, and sharing in the fellowship meals and the prayers.

-- Acts 2:37-42 (GNB)