When going out to dinner with my wife, she will many times ask if she can substitute something on the menu for something else. Recently that word, substitute, started floating around in my mind.
How many times in life do we substitute for something? A good example is prescriptions. I take a prescription for cholesterol. I substitute a generic drug for the more expensive one. Instead of buying new tires, you might substitute used tires. In Hollywood, they usually bring in a substitute to stand in for the dangerous scenes. You get the point. The definition of substitute is, “The act, process, or result of substituting one thing for another, to put or use in the place of another.”
Do you realize that we were all created in the image of God? Genesis 1:26, “Then God said, ‘Let Us make man in Our image ...’” When he did that, he put a “God Hole” in our heart that ONLY God can fill. This writer spent a lot of years trying to fill that “God Hole” with everything but God. I poured in alcohol, lust, marriages, material possessions such as boats, pickups and nice houses ... all to no avail. Oh, I got some temporary relief, but nothing lasting.
Solomon pretty much summed up my life in the book of Ecclesiastes when he said his life was “all vanity, and nothing but grasping for the wind.” The word vanity means “empty.” Have you ever tried to catch the wind? What I ended up doing was trying to fill a “God Hole” with empty things. I almost ended up at the end of a .357. Then I went to a friend and he told me I needed Jesus.
I tried Jesus and the rest is history. What I now realize is that for years, I was trying to put natural things into a spiritual “God Hole.” When I asked Jesus into my heart, the Holy Spirit came in and HE is the one who filled that “God Hole.” In essence, God filled the hole he created. My life has never been the same.
Let’s look at some other substitutes in the Bible. Remember when Moses went upon the mountain to meet with God? What did the people do? They substituted a golden calf for God. Just like us, they wanted something they could see. How many of us have substituted TV, cellphone, Facebook, Snap Chat, entertainment, hobbies, alcohol, drugs, pills, lust, money — the list could go on and on — to fill that “God Hole?”
Remember the man who was begging for alms in the book of Acts? What did Peter tell him? Acts 3:6, “Then Peter said, ‘Silver and gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you: In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk.’” Peter substituted healing for alms.
In closing, I want to tell you about the greatest substitute that ever lived. You know who I am going to say already, don’t you? Jesus, Jesus, Jesus! He IS the ultimate substitute. Remember the definition of substitute: replacing one thing for another. He substituted HIS life for OUR sin. Can you just grasp that? Paul describes what Jesus did in 2 Corinthians 5:21, “For He made Him (Jesus) who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” (My emphasis). That scripture has sent me to my knees more than once.
I am so grateful that when Jesus was praying in the garden that he didn’t ask his father if he could find a substitute to take his place. No, Jesus became the substitute.
Friends, there is NO other substitute for your salvation. Referring to Jesus, Luke tells us in Acts 4:12, “Nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.”
Hasselstrom is an evangelist with Cross Tied Ministries.
