By Nana Yaw Aidoo 

A story is told of a man in white apparel who walked along a railway line. As he journeyed, he realised there was a death trap in the form of a manhole in the railway. He thought to himself, “if a train comes this way, all aboard will perish”. Hardly had he finished thinking, than he heard the horn of a train plying that railway and approaching the manhole. Immediately, this young man broke his skin with a jack-knife which he had in his possession, took of his white shirt and stained it with blood. After that, he began to wave the shirt, all along forcing out blood from his cut and drenching his white shirt in blood the more. He waved and waved the blood stained shirt and as a result, the train ground to a halt, where this young man of about 33 years stood. All aboard the train got off to check out why a man stood in a railway, waving a shirt, which was now totally red with blood. It was at this point that they realised what the man had done. But alas! The young man was dead. He had died from a loss of so much blood. He had put down his life so those on the train could live. 

Likewise, our Lord Jesus Christ laid down His life so that all could live. Being God, His omniscience ensured He knew man would sin and as a result, He put in place a plan to save man even before the creation of the world (Ephesians 1:3-5, 3:9-12). His love abounded even before He had created man. He left His majesty and royalty and came down to earth to die for the world (Philippians 2:5-8). All He expects from us is our belief, obedience and faithfulness so that we should not perish but have everlasting life (John 3:16; Hebrews 5:9). Why should we say no to this love? 

The apostle Paul nailed it when he said, “For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again on the third day according to the scriptures” (1 Corinthians 15:3-4). We benefit from this great love when we have faith in God and in His Son Jesus Christ (Hebrews 11:6; John 8:24), repent of our sins (Luke 13:3-5; Acts 17:30), make that great confession that “Jesus Christ is the Son of God” (Romans 10:9-10; Acts 8:37) and are baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of our sins (Acts 2:38; Acts 23:16). Only after we’ve done these things will we be saved from our sins and added to the body of those who have been saved, the church of Christ (Acts 2:47; Matthew 16:18) and then we begin living the Christian life. If we remain faithful until death, we will receive the crown of eternal life (Revelation 2:10; 2 Timothy 4:7-8). 

……….And that is the greatest love story ever told.