The Jews, the Chinese and the New Year

With Chinese New Year coming, let us contrast the attitude of the Jews and the Chinese towards a new year.
The Jews celebrate Rosh Hashanah as the start of the civil year in Israel. It is a time of reflection and soul-searching, seeking forgiveness from God and remembering His judgment. It marks the chance for repentance and forgiveness in the eyes of God and to start afresh with a clear conscience in the coming year.
The Chinese celebrates the New Year with much superstition. Cleaning the house symbolizes sweeping away all traces of misfortune. To avoid bad luck, people, especially children, must be at their best behaviour. Fireworks were used to chase away evil spirits. Putting on new clothes symbolizes discarding of the old year and its misfortunes. The whole objective is to improve their luck for the coming year to achieve greater material prosperity.

Becoming a Christian

A person who claimed to be a Christian should be interested in these three things:

1. Who is this Jesus Christ that saved me?
2. What am I saved from? (If the person who spoke to you did not make it clear.)
3. How should I act thereafter?

I remembered this is how I became a Christian. A friend and I was outside the squash court at my school and he use the four spiritual laws to tell me about Christianity. Usually I was against Christianity. But on this occasion, I listened and just accept Christ as my saviour. After I became a Christian, I kept saying to myself, "I am now a Christian." But I did not know what I should do next. My friend who brought me to Christ just asked me to attend the Christian Fellowship at the Church next to my school on the coming Wednesday. Thereafter, I just attended the Wednesday meetings during the school days. My Bible is just a collect of booklets of three of the four Gospels (I did not have the Gospel of Matthew). I did not have the whole Bible with me. I managed to buy one later but was confiscated by my father. My knowledge of Christianity grew only after I joined my current Church.

Works do not add merit to salvation

All the works that we do after believing in Christ do not add any merit to us. So likewise ye, when ye shall have done all those things which are commanded you, say, We are unprofitable servants: we have done that which was our duty to do (Luke 17:10 KJV). So why don't we just sit down and enjoy ourselves after salvation? After all, it is free. What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? (Romans 6:1 KJV). No. The "good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them (Ephesians 2:10 KJV)" have their purposes.

To glorifies God
Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven. (Matthew 5:16 KJV)

To confirm your faith
The works that you have done, the fruits that you have produced will confirm to yourself and to others that you are a true Christian, that you truly believe in Christ as your saviour.
Therefore, brethren, be all the more diligent to make certain about His calling and choosing you; for as long as you practice these things, you will never stumble; (2 Peter 1:10 NASB)

To witness to others
Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith, and I have works: show me thy faith without thy works, and I will show thee my faith by my works. (James 2:18 KJV)

While salvation is free, discipleship is costly. So we should work out our salvation "with fear and trembling. For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure. (Philippians 2:12-13 KJV)".

Salvation by faith so easy and yet so difficult

Salvation is by faith only. It is simple. It is free. But many people find it difficult to accept that they have no part in their own salvation. They feel that they must do something. Why is it so difficult for men to believe that Jesus Christ had died for their sins and is able to save them? The faith required to believe in this fact is the same as the faith you need when your teacher told you that the earth is round. Men readily believe in many things, except that Christ died for their sins.

Spiritual Pride
"The Pharisee stood and was praying this to himself: 'God, I thank You that I am not like other people: swindlers, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I pay tithes of all that I get.'" (Luke 18:11-12 NASB)
When one accepts Christ as his saviour, it implies that he is a sinner. Not only that, he is such a horrible sinner that he cannot save himself. Many people accept that they are imperfect, but still good enough, just like the Pharisee in the above parable by Jesus.

Cultural Pride
But Naaman was furious and went away and said, "Behold, I thought, 'He will surely come out to me and stand and call on the name of the LORD his God, and wave his hand over the place and cure the leper.' Are not Abanah and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? Could I not wash in them and be clean?" So he turned and went away in a rage. (2 Kings 5:11-12 NASB)
Naaman, the distinguished general who had often led the Arameans to victory, find it difficult to accept that to cure himself of leprosy, he had to wash in the Israelite river of Jordan. It is not a difficult task (everybody knows how to take a bath), but where to wash is the problem.

Salvation is easy. But many worked hard to find it and is unable to do so. Like the Chinese proverb, which said the one broke his iron shoes to look for something, but he can get it without effort (踏破铁鞋无觅处，得来全不费工夫 ).

Salvation is by faith only

For by grace are ye saved through faith (Ephesians 2:8 KJV), so what kind of faith are we talking about? It is the ordinary faith that we get by in our daily life.

If a friend invites me for dinner at his house at 6 pm, I will just go to his house for dinner. I have faith in him that when I reach his house, there will be dinner for me. I know my friend and I trust (that is, have faith) him.

So likewise it is with Christ. He said He will save me, and I believe Him. For I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day (2 Timothy 1:12 KJV).

Salvation is by faith only. The faith needed is the same faith that we live our ordinary life. There is nothing special needed and it is available to all men. It has to be made so simple, because men are extremely sinful. Any additional process will require men's effort and participation. But they are not fit to play any part in this process of salvation.

Jesus is the only way

This is the key message of the Bible, a library of sixty books - Jesus saves; God saves; there is no other way.

John 14:6
Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.

Acts 4:12
Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved.

Ephesians 4:4
There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling;

1 Timothy 2:5
For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus;

Isaiah 43:11
I, even I, am the LORD; and beside me there is no savior.

Isaiah 45:22
Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else.

2 Corinthians 1:20
For all the promises of God in him are yea, and in him Amen, unto the glory of God by us.

Salvation by Grace through Faith

Salvation is by the grace of God, and through faith alone. Not of works, lest any man should boast.

Ephesians 2:8-9
For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast.

Titus 3:5
Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost;

Galatians 2:21
I do not frustrate the grace of God: for if righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain.

2 Timothy 1:9
Who hath saved us, and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began,

John 6:37
All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.