Jesus said: Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven" (Matthew 18:3 KJV) Rabindranath Tagore, the great Indian poet and philosopher, said this passage was the most beautiful passage in the bible.
But what is conversion? Converted comes from "con", with, and "vertare", to turn - "to turn with." The big question in life is, is my face or my back toward Christ? The first step in the new life is to turn your back on the old life and face toward Christ. You do not do that alone - there is the "with". The moment you throw your will in His direction, He is there with you. He helps you to do what you can't do - to break with the old life - but that decision to turn around is your decision. There you stand alone and as a free moral being you make the decision alone, severely alone. The moment you make it, however, He is "with" you.
Eli Stanley Jones was a 20th century Methodist Christian missionary and theologian. He is remembered chiefly for his interreligious lectures to the educated classes in India, thousands of which were held across the Indian subcontinent during the first decades of the 20th century.
Jones was born in Baltimore, Maryland. After attending Asbury University, he became a missionary in the Methodist Episcopal Church. He traveled to India and began working with the lowest castes, including Dalits. He became close friends with many leaders in the Indian Independence movement, and became known for his interfaith work. He said, "“Peace is a by-product of conditions out of which peace naturally comes. If reconciliation is God’s chief business, it is ours—between man and God, between man and himself, and between man and man.” He was nominated for Nobel Peace Prize for his reconciliation work in Asia, Africa, and between Japan and the United States.
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