Most people recognize this problem called sin. All men (including women) suffer from this blight. An article in the Canberra times caught my eye last week. The name of the article was Where rivers and holy Hindus meet. The Hindus had traveled great distances to the Ganges, Yamuna and Sarasvati rivers during the Maha Kumbn festival. The paper refers to these pilgrims as naked, ash-smeared saints. An estimated 40 million pilgrims with 20 million taking a quick dip in the polluted waters. All for what purpose? so that by dipping in the fridged waters that are cleansed of their sin and frees them from the cycle of reincarnation (go through life over and over again till you get it right). Wow all you have to do to be right with the gods is to take a dip, believe it and be forever changed.
Many of these people have traveled great distances on foot just to go through this ritual. Many will remember the tsunami of Dec 26 2004. Some pilgrims at a similar ritual bathing met a deadly fate on that day. So what is about this activity? The waters in the rivers are polluted and filthy from people and industrial waste. It can’t be about physical cleansing. Really it just comes down to what we all know some how, that there is a creator and somehow we all fall short. People throughout time have sought things that they can do to bridge that gap.
People realized they are lost , helpless and hopeless. They like the Pharisees have sought a righteousness not of God but of themselves. (Romans 10:1-4). Christ was the only one to come and do what we cannot do for ourselves. It took God coming in the flesh to fix what man had destroyed. He offers salvation to all who will come to Him, come to Him right where you are. You don’t have to travel, only cry out for mercy. He will truly change your heart and your desires. It is about following and obeying because of what He has done for you not because of what you can or have done. It is done in spite of our sin, failings, rebellion, fleshly desires. He gave His all so that all He has could be yours while you leave behind the worldly things that perish. Come and see, taste and know that the Lord is good (Psalm 34:8 ).
Getting in a river gets you wet, in Christ is life everlasting.
Sherman
1 Peter3:18 For Christ also died for sins once for all, the just for the unjust, so that He might bring us to God, having been put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit;19 in which also He went and made proclamation to the spirits now in prison,20 who once were disobedient, when the patience of God kept waiting in the days of Noah, during the construction of the ark, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through the water.21 Corresponding to that, baptism now saves you-- not the removal of dirt from the flesh, but an appeal to God for a good conscience-- through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, 22 who is at the right hand of God, having gone into heaven, after angels and authorities and powers had been subjected to Him.
