My daughter Kathryn and I teach at a Bible Institute in Nepal. We try to go once a year. This is an email I received from one of our students. His name is Suresh Budhaprithi. I thought it would make a good blog. It has been slightly edited for format purposes:
Coronavirus, known as COVID-19, has severely affected the lives of people around the globe. But I would like to shed light upon a virus which is a thousand times more dangerous and deadly than COVID-19. It is the virus that people have been carrying from generation to generation, often without even noticing it. In other words, you may not know that you have this virus, and surprisingly, many infected persons fail to realize it, and they are reluctant to accept this bitter truth. The deadly virus that I am writing about here is the virus of sin.
The novel coronavirus is a newly discovered virus in the world. However, the virus of sin has been in the world since the fall of human beings in the Garden of Eden. While not everyone will catch the coronavirus, nobody can escape the effect of the virus of sin. The virus of sin keeps unbelieving mankind from being accepted in the eyes of God.
Since all are infected by the virus of sin, all are sinners. The wages of sin is death. More importantly, the unbeliever does not have eternal life. Before a person can receive eternal life, the issue of his sins has to be addressed.
The cure for the coronavirus has not been discovered yet. However, the cure for the deadly virus of sin has already been found. It is revealed in the Scriptures. First Peter 2:24 says that Jesus bore our sins in His own body on the cross. Jesus paid for all of our sins—past, present, future. All of our sins have been paid for!
As a result, God can and does give eternal life to all who believe in Jesus for it (John 3:16). All of this is by God’s grace, a free gift that anyone can receive for free (Eph 2:8-9). We live in a world where you get nothing for free, but in this case, there are no hidden costs. The Scripture says in Acts 16:31: “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved.” All you have to do is believe in Jesus for eternal life. There are no other “do’s” or “don’ts.” There are no other conditions.
But there is another piece of great news when it comes to the virus of sin. Not only did Jesus pay for all of our sins so we can receive eternal life as a free gift, but His death also makes it possible for us to no longer be slaves of sin. In 1 Pet 2:24 Peter adds that Christ died for our sin so that we “might die to sins and live for righteousness.” Paul says that when we believed in Jesus for eternal life, we became new creations (2 Cor 5:17). Through the Spirit that lives within us, as believers, we can live victorious lives. We don’t have to be impacted by the consequences of sin.
If you are reading this and have never believed in Jesus for eternal life, I hope you do that right where you are. Because Jesus has taken care of your sin once for all, the offer of eternal life is for you. For those of us who have already believed and know we have eternal life, the virus of sin does not have to rob us of experiencing the life we have in Christ right now. We can experience abundant life (John 10:10). The world is trying to find a vaccine for COVID-19. In Christ, we already have the cure for the problem of sin.
