But how do you open your heart and life to receive that love? I would like to take these final paragraphs to walk you through that process, and encourage you to take the most wonderful step life can afford. If you have already read the book, you will remember some of these truths from previous chapters. If you jumped to the conclusion, you will want to go back and review. Either way, let’s bring them all together now. Let’s find out what they mean for you, in your desire to accept God’s love and begin to know Him personally.

First, you need to acknowledge that you are a sinner. All of us are. This just means we are fallible human beings, imperfect, prone to doing things that separate us from God. The Bible says it this way: “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23).

God’s love is perfect. But everything about God is perfect, including His holiness and His justice. Because He loves us, He wants to forgive us. Because He is holy and just, He must deal with our sin. And the Bible says that “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23).

Unless God were to find a way to intervene on our behalf, unless He were to devise a plan to bring us together that would satisfy both His love and His justice, we would be doomed to an eternity of separation and punishment.

But here is the Gospel—the good news of God’s plan: God sent His only Son to this earth to give Himself as a sacrifice for our sin: “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8).

Jesus Christ is the only One who has ever walked upon this earth and lived a perfect, sinless life. As the spotless Lamb of God, He died on the cross in our place, and the punishment of our sin was placed upon Him. That means that at the time of judgment, as God prepares to judge the sins you’ve committed, Christ steps forward and says, “This person’s sin-debts are paid in full.”

On the cross, God looked at His Son and saw your sin, which Christ had taken upon Himself. At judgment, God looks at you and sees Christ’s righteousness, which has been thrown over you like a white robe. Because Christ takes your sin and gives you His righteousness, the problem of your acceptability to a holy God has been resolved.