Chapter 46

The Way to Live Forever

JEHOVAH has given us many wonderful gifts. One of his finest gifts to us is life. Without it we could not do anything, could we?⁠— But if we want to keep that gift, there are some things that we must do.

You are doing one of those things right now. So am I. We do it all day and all night, even when we are asleep. If we were to stop, we would die right away. Do you know what it is?⁠— Yes, we are breathing.

There are other things that we do every day to keep alive. Can you name some of them?⁠— We eat food. We drink water. And we sleep. God made us so that we cannot live without these things.

None of them are hard to do. In fact, I like eating. Don’t you?⁠— But how does food keep us alive? Do you know? What happens to it after we swallow it?⁠—

Our body breaks the food into very tiny pieces. Then the blood carries these to every part of our body. This food is used in a marvelous way to build new bone, new flesh, new hair, nails, eyes and other body parts. Did you know that?⁠—

You may wonder what happens to the old  body parts. These die off a little bit at a time and are taken away as wastes. The new ones take their place.

These changes are happening everywhere in our body. It does not take very long until our whole body is made over. Jehovah made our body so that it does this. He made it so that it would go on doing it forever. Yes, he made man to live forever.

But people die. Why?⁠— Because Adam sinned against God. And we got sin from Adam. He spoiled man’s good relationship with God. And our life depends on God.

To live forever, we need more than air and water and food and sleep. We need to have the right standing with God.

There is no doctor that can make us live forever. There is no magic pill that will keep us from dying. The only way we can live forever is by drawing close to God. The Great Teacher tells us how to do that.

Let’s get our Bibles and open them to John chapter 17, verse 3. Here we find what Jesus said: “This means everlasting life, their taking in knowledge of you, the only true God, and of the one whom you sent forth, Jesus Christ.”

What did the Great Teacher say that we need in order to live forever?⁠— We need to take in knowledge. That means we need to learn. That is why we study the Bible.

But how will learning about Jehovah help us  to live forever?⁠— Remember, all life comes from him. To have his favor, we must worship him as the only true God. But we cannot worship him in the right way unless we listen to what he says. Just as we need food every day, so we need to learn about Jehovah every day. This keeps us close to him. The Bible says: ‘Man must live, not on bread alone, but on all the words that come from Jehovah’s mouth.’​—Matthew 4:4.

We also need to take in knowledge about someone besides God. Who is that?⁠— Jesus Christ. This is because God sent Jesus to take away sin. He can take away the harm that Adam did when Adam sinned against God. Jesus can help us to get back into a good relationship with God. And that is not possible in any other way.

That is why the Bible says: “There is no salvation in anyone else.” We have to learn about Jesus if we want to live forever. And if we really do have faith in him, we will be able to live forever. When he  brings good conditions to all the earth, he will help us to live forever and be happy. It is a sure thing. That is why the Bible says: “He that exercises faith in the Son has everlasting life.”​—Acts 4:12; John 3:36.

Now, what does it mean to ‘exercise faith’ in Jesus?⁠— It means that we really believe that we cannot stay alive without him. We believe that God gives us everlasting life through Jesus. Do you believe that?⁠—

‘Exercising faith’ in Jesus means something else too. It means that we believe him so much that we do what he says. We do not do just some things and not others. We do all the things he says. And we do them because we really want to. Is that what you want to do?⁠—

One of the things that the Great Teacher tells us to do is to talk to other people about God and his kingdom. He did it himself to show us how. So, if we have really learned from Jesus, that is something that we will do. Do you do that?⁠—

But that is not all that counts. Every day we should do the things that the Bible says are right. We must be careful not to do bad things. We should show that we truly love one another.

If we do these things, it shows that we have really been listening to the Great Teacher.

(True disciples of Jesus Christ will really be able to live forever in happiness right on this earth. Read what the Bible says about this at Psalm 37:29, 34 [36:29, 34, Dy], Matthew 19:16-21 and Romans 6:23.)