The answer is wonderfully simple -- you hear the Gospel, you believe it, and you receive what it has to offer. And what it has to offer is better than anything you could ever dream or imagine!

But what is the Gospel?

The Gospel is good news and it's all about Jesus, God's Son.
God has commissioned messengers to go out into the whole world with a message of great good news. He is speaking to the world but he is also speaking to you, personally.

The Gospel is God is speaking to the whole world.

The Gospel is a royal announcement from God the Creator to the world he made. It declares that Jesus is Lord. The One the world put to death was God's Son. God has raised him from the dead and seated him on the his throne in heaven and given him all authority in heaven and on earth. The Gospel is God's summons to the whole world to recognize what he has done and to bow and honor Jesus as Lord.

The Gospel is also a victory announcement to the world. God's Son came into the world like a mighty warrior not to judge but to save. God gave him over to death in order to save the world and his resurrection from the dead is God's declaration that this has been accomplished.

The Son of God has been victorious!
        Salvation has come to us!
            The Kingdom of God has arrived, and Jesus is Lord!

The gospel is going forth to all nations announcing this wonderful news with convincing power. It is calling people to be reconciled to God through Jesus and to enter his Kingdom.

But you mustn't think of the Gospel as just a general public announcement.

The Gospel is a personal invitation to you.

The Gospel speaks to us one person at a time. Jesus the Lord is welcoming you right now into a real and personal relationship of love with himself. He is the King but he is also humble and gentle of heart, full of kindness and compassion.

He says, "Come to me and I will give you eternal life.
            Come freely,
                come as a great sinner,
                          come and drink from the waters of life."

Jesus is not demanding something from you, he is offering you himself. He is calling you to receive from him: "Come to me and be set free, come to me and have your thirst quenched, come to me and have your burdens lifted, come out of the darkness into the light. Come, leave your empty way of life and have all the condemnation removed from you. Have your conscience cleansed and draw near to God's throne of grace. Come to me and I will receive you with great love and make you new."

How is it that Jesus is able to offer all these things to us?

The Gospel tells of a great exchange.

The exchange took place on the cross. Jesus was born in Israel, about 2000 years ago. After teaching and doing many miraculous signs, he was executed by the Romans. The form of execution they used was a wooden cross, where the hands and feet were nailed down and people hung until they died.

Jesus died on the cross like countless other people, but he was the sinless Son of God and his death was unique because it was a great exchange. In obedience to his Father, he voluntarily took our place and became everything that we are and deserve and -- in exchange -- won for us everything that he is and deserves.

On the cross Jesus took our place in judgment. What this tells us about ourselves and about God is awesome and unexpected. It says is that our sin runs deeper than we know. We are more powerless to change ourselves, more 'against God' in our hearts than we realize, and God is more righteous in his judgment against our sin than we can comprehend.

We are without hope except that in love God sent his Son to die in our place and suffer the death and judgment we deserve. God made him to be sin, our sin. That's what was happening when Jesus was crucified – our sin was being condemned.

Three days later he was raised triumphantly from the grave and his resurrection is our new life. Everyone who believes in him is delivered out of judgment and death and brought into his eternal life of freedom and joy in the presence of God.

We would never have dreamed of such of a love if it hadn't been revealed to us in this breathtaking way. That's why Jesus said, "When I am lifted up I will draw all people to myself." It's the power of his love revealed in his death that draws us to him and teaches us to trust him.

When you put your trust in him, your old life is exchanged for his new life. All your sin is freely and completely forgiven and you are united with him. He shares everything he has with you in love.

This exchange of love has many sides to it:

•    You are taken beyond judgment and condemnation into the Kingdom of God's Son and seated with him on his throne.
•    Your are set free from the fear of death by the guarantee that you will share in his resurrection.
•    The old person you were dies and he pours his Holy Spirit into you and gives you new life.
•    You are delivered out of slavery into freedom, out of a life controlled by sin into his life of obedience to God.
•    You are no longer an orphan because God adopts you in great love and becomes your Father, and makes you an heir with Jesus of all things in heaven and on earth.
•    You leave your isolation and loneliness behind and enter into an intimate personal relationship of love with him.

When he comes again, you will be fully transformed to be like Jesus and you will be with him forever in the new heavens and the new earth. Until then you may suffer as he suffered in the world, but nothing can separate you from his love.

The Gospel tells you that you are more sinful than you ever dared imagine, but more loved and accepted and blessed in Christ than you ever dared dream.

If you want to become a Christian, this is how: You simply believe the Gospel, put your trust in Jesus and receive him and all this grace he is offering to you.

"Lord Jesus, I believe God has raised you from the dead and that you are Lord. I trust in your exchange on the cross and accept what it says about me. I ask that my sins be forgiven and that I be given new life. I trust your welcome to me and your love for me and I come to you. I turn from my old life and receive all that you offer me. And I praise and thank you with all my heart. Amen."

One last thing -- becoming a Christian is very personal but it's not just a private, individual matter. Jesus says we must make our faith public through a concrete act – baptism -- and we must become part of his church.

Baptism shows that we are spiritually united not only to Jesus but also to his people. We receive a family made up of all other believers. The Christian life is a "together" life. The Holy Spirit unites us together as one and we live by faith together, worshipping and receiving from him, serving and loving one another, witnessing to him in the world through our words and our acts of love, and sometimes suffering together in his name until he comes again.