Faith is what saves, faith in Jesus Christ as the Son of God. Now this faith isn't just a belief but also involves obedience. True faith is believing in and obeying Jesus.

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Firstly, you need to be aware that as a non-Christian the way you live your life is not pleasing to God. He loves you but some of the things you do He can't stand.

The Lord created man to live in unity with and have fellowship with Him. But since the first man and woman sinned they did something that God had said not to do and therefore didn't live to please God but to please themselves. This attitude permeated the whole of humankind and is like our inheritance handed down from generation to generation as an attitude of wanting to please ourselves and doing what we want to do rather than pleasing God. The things we do that are against God's will are what we call sin.

Often we think of the big things like stealing, murder, etc as sins but even the 'little things' like lying and cheating and gossiping are still sin and displease God. In fact you and I and all men and women are sinful because we have all inherited it and are naturally prone to sin. By our own strength we are unable to live a life that pleases God because sin is something that God just can't stand and even if we try really hard we still will sin eventually and displease God.

God is Holy, which means He is utterly sinless, He doesn't sin and won't abide with sin. Another important aspect of God is that He loves us very much. As much as he is holy, by the same measure He is also love.

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Now the problem was that whilst our sin had to be paid for, and the penalty of sin is death, God loves us that much that he didn't want us to have to pay that price. That is why Jesus Christ died on the cross for us, to pay the price for our sins so that we don't have to die for them and so that we may again have fellowship with God because our sins have been paid for and are no longer held against us. When you give your heart to the Lord, which means you ask Him to come in to your life, there are a few things that you are doing that you need to understand. The first thing is that you are humbly acknowledging your need for Christ, you are asking the Lord to take charge of your life ( we call this dying to yourself ), you want Him to lead you and guide you and you are saying that you will follow His direction.

You are asking Him to forgive you your sins and it is good at this time to confess your sins openly and honestly to Him for the Bible says 'Confess your sins and He is faithful and just to forgive you your sins and to cleanse you from all unrighteousness' ( 1 John 1 : 9 ).

Now some people say that they are too sinful for God to accept and they feel that they need to clean their act up before they come to the Lord. That is the wrong way of looking at things. We first need to understand that the Lord WANTS to forgive us. He wants no one to perish 2 Peter 3 : 9. Jesus died on the cross to pay the price for sin. Whose sin? Ours. We have all sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Salvation is like a door to an obedient life in that as we put our faith in Christ and give our hearts to the Lord the Holy Spirit is able to work in our lives to help us to be obedient. It is through the Holy Spirit's power that we are able to resist sin and be obedient. We don't need to come to the Lord with our lives all cleaned up but we need to come to Him with a desire to be obedient and a willingness to be changed.

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You are also asking Him to send His Holy Spirit to live in you ( Matt. 3 : 11 ). This is called the Baptism in the Holy Spirit. The word Christian is derived from the term 'Christ in' and the Lord is within all born-again Christians who have died to or turned from their old sinful ways. The Holy Spirit brings our spirit alive to God, we are 'born again' and this is a life changing event. Sometimes you will not receive the Baptism in the Holy Spirit until you have been baptised in water which is a public declaration of your faith in Jesus Christ and your becoming a Christian. The actual Baptism is where you confess your allegiance to Christ and you are dunked below the water usually in an oversized bath made for the purpose and usually in front of the members of your church and any other people you wish to invite but you may choose to be baptised in a lake or wherever.

This baptism, as well as being a public declaration is also like a picture of what Christ has done in your life. Going under the waters of baptism means that you are dying to the old you and rising out of the waters of baptism is like arising to a new life where you are living to and for Christ. Sometimes you feel the Holy Spirit straight away and this may lead you to speak in a new tongue or language which, for the new believer, is an awesome confirmation of the indwelling Holy Spirit and sometimes things are not quite as dramatic or sudden but as long as you openly ask for the Holy Spirit, determine to walk in obedience, confess your sins regularly ( remember that Christians aren't perfect, but they are forgiven, meaning that you will still sin occasionally ) and trust the Lord for the Holy Spirit, He will come when the time is right, He may even come before water baptism.

And the most awesome thing of all is that Jesus Christ is God. God came to earth as the man Christ Jesus and died on the cross for you so that by faith in Him you are saved.

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What do you need to do? Live in the grateful knowledge of God's love and ask Him to help you to love Him more. An important way in which you can show your love for Him is by reading His word, the Bible, learning what He likes and doesn't like and following the examples and teachings of the righteous people in the Bible whilst learning not to follow the example of the unrighteous people and examples in the Bible.

Another important thing you need to do is to spend time in prayer with God every day. When you meet a new friend and you want that new friendship to grow you need to spend time with that friend and time thinking about that friend. It's the same with your relationship with God. Spend time with Him in prayer and thinking about Him and what He is like and your friendship with Him will grow, you'll develop a closer relationship. But if you don't spend time with Him your relationship may grow cold. Be diligent knowing that we are all vulnerable if we don't put in the effort to please God as best we can and trust God to forgive us for when we slip up.

Remember that whilst God uses your conscience to make you aware of sin and that is why you feel guilty when you do something wrong, He does this so that you can be aware of your sin and repent of it, that is turn from it and confess your sin to Him because He wants to forgive you; He doesn't want to condemn you. You may sometimes here the expression 'to keep short accounts with God' and that means confessing regularly so that you walk in righteousness and don't become weighed down with sin. So if you feel condemned even though you confess your sin to Christ and try not to do it again realise that that is Satan trying to make you feel bad about yourself. He does this so that you will believe the lie that you aren't good enough to receive God's forgiveness. Remember that is a lie. You are good enough not because of what you have done but because you have put your trust in Christ.

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Another thing which you should do is fellowship with other Christians and this is one good reason to go to church, to be with like-minded people who have given their lives to Jesus Christ also, so that by spending time with them you may gain strength in the knowledge that you are not alone as a Christian, that you all experience trials but that you can support each other through those times.

Remember that preaching is a way in which God brings His message to you, the preacher is in effect being God's mouthpiece and a part of his job is to equip the saints for service which means to equip you and I to serve the Lord as effectively as possible. The message may not always be relevant to you but you will find that often times the message is. God bless you in Jesus' name.

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You know, the Bible says that we are all sons of God through faith in Christ ( Gal. 3 : 26 ) and what that means is that God adopts you as His child when you accept Christ as your Lord. That being the case, all those people who go to church and have given their lives to Christ are your brothers and sisters. How exciting! Look at how big a family you have inherited. You belong to a world-wide family who love God too. So be encouraged to spend time with Christians, go to church, realise that although you may feel like you stick out like a sore thumb when you first go to church most of us felt that way at first but as your brothers and sisters in Christ we want the best for you and we want to help you if we can. We've all come out of the world, as we say, which means that we were all unsaved once and we all get tempted in the same ways, so welcome to the family.

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