Key Passage: Matthew 5:27-30

Topic: Sin

"And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell." (Matthew 5:30, ESV)

These are the words of Jesus and remember, He is God. Reading them we get an idea just how seriously God takes our wrongdoing.

Jesus goes on to tell His listeners that it's better to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell.

Hell is not a place we think about a lot. We're so busy with life "at the moment" that we don't even consider life after death. And yet life here and now is like the blink of an eye compared to "forever."

It's true that we have an enemy, Satan, who makes sin look glamorous and pleasurable to us. But compared to an eternity of pain in hell, it loses its attraction.

Consider this: If God who loves us would rather see us go through life without a limb or without vision rather than spend eternity in hell, how terrible, unendingly terrible, that place will be!

These are shockingly strong words from a loving Savior, a warning we need to heed now from a God of love.