This article was written by 12-year-old Sami for her Bible class. Her mother sent this to us and we are so pleased to see how God is working in her life. It is also exciting that someone this age can express such a beautiful picture of God! In this article, Sami addresses some of the most important questions of all: "Who is Jesus?" and "What is the Gospel?" What do you think of her conclusions?
“Who Am I?” My mom gave me two simple questions to answer for my End of the Year Bible project. My project is to summarize all of the things I have learned with an essay. These questions were coming from the perspective of Jesus, saying, Who do you think I am?, and, What is the Gospel to you? Of all the questions I have answered, these two were the simplest, but yet the most complicated. Here is my answer: There are a lot of different beliefs out there such as what people think of Jesus, but this particular question is addressing one person, which is me. I support my answer with evidence based on Scripture 100%. Jesus is the very begotten Son of God. (John 3:16) The answer is plain and simple. But could there be more under the obvious answer? Jesus is the exact representation of His Father. Meaning that His Character is the same as God the Father. God sent His Son into this world that He might free us from the bondage of sin and its destructive grip that it has on us. Jesus said, "If you have seen me you have seen the Father." ( John 14:9 )
I have a question also: If God gets so angry over our sins, and if Jesus is exactly like His Father, then at the cross, wouldn’t Jesus kill his enemies and punish those who were torturing Him? If you look through the judgmental perspective, that would make sense, but if you look at the bigger picture, from Genesis to Revelation, you will see that God isn’t mad at anyone. I often see God as a Great Physician who wants us to take the remedy for our sins. This is having the likeness of Christ in you. I also see God as a perfect Father who wants us to trust Him with our lives. God does not punish His wicked children in Hell forever. He loves us too much for that to even cross His mind! His “wrath” is just plainly letting us go. (Romans 1:18,24,26,28) I personally think wrath should be replaced with some other words such as pity, or sadness. (Hosea 11) The word wrath makes people form a totally different view of God because on this earth, wrath in our dictionary means anger of some sort. God’s world is different than ours and sometimes words He used to represent something, got misused, misunderstood, and formed false images of God in people’s minds. Like a father, though, God does discipline His children if He has to. (Heb. 12:111)
There was yet another part of the question. It asks “What is the Gospel?” My understanding is that God is not the kind of person His enemies have portrayed Him to be. He is not the liar Satan had said God was in the Garden,(Rev 12:9, Gen 2:1617, 3:14) and He isn’t the wrathful, arbitrary, and severe Judge in the end either. (Jn 12:4450) His Judgement is based on love (1 Cor. 13) and is WAY BEYOND our level of thinking. This is my understanding of Jesus and the Gospel. This is the larger view to me and I am proud to know such a loving knowledge about God’s true character. I really hope that such knowledge will spread to the people around me.
God Bless,
Sami