What must I do to be Saved

"What must I do to be saved?” They replied, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved—you and your household.” Acts 16:30-31

“For God so LOVED the world that He GAVE His only Son, that whosoever believes in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life.” John 3:16

Our Pastor gave one of the best sermons of his entire ministry last Sunday, and it was truly a powerful message and challenge to all of us of the importance of sharing our faith with others. It reminded me of the importance to always look for opportunities to start conversations with my co workers, family members and friends. It also started me to thinking about how we take for granted that our listening audience even understands what we are talking about when we try to tell them about their need for salvation. I have been raised as a Christian my entire life. I am used to commonly used verbiage of my beliefs… Grace, Repentance, Salvation, Sanctification, Righteousness… all the familiar words and phrases of my faith, but we need to remember that we now live in a world where most people have no idea what they mean. The Church is not a dominant influence in our society anymore, the Bible is not respected or referred to, the precious name of Jesus Christ is mocked and ridiculed and people have lost their sense of need when it comes to reconciliation with a Holy God. I have to stop and consider that when you tell someone, “Good news! Good news! You need to be saved… and Here’s how to get saved: Believe in Jesus!!”, they may very well be thinking, “Saved from what? Jesus who?” Obviously, there is something missing in the approach that well meaning Christians use when they assume that people know what they are referring to when they tell people that they need to be saved. It is important, then, to prepare to share your faith in simple common ways so that people will understand and be open to the message of saving grace. So what does it mean to “be saved”. Saved from what? Why do we need a Savior? Don’t we all just try to live good lives, and hope for the best? Don’t we all go to the same place anyway? And then there are people who realize they need to be saved and then think they have to “DO” something to be saved, as our passage in Acts indicated from over 2,000 years ago. What does God say about this…. Let’s look at it together:

First of all, it’s difficult to understand the good news of being saved if you don’t understand the bad news. So let’s go back to the beginning when God created everything: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. (Genesis 1:1) When God created everything He said it was “very good.” This meant that everything was perfect. The whole creation was perfect. In fact, God says that all His works are perfect, and we would expect that from a perfect God. Man lived in the perfectly created earth (i.e., a paradise) with a perfect relationship with God. Our Heavenly Father created mankind to be in fellowship with Him, but He also gave man and woman the freedom of choice to embrace Him or reject Him. This is called “Free Will”. Why did God do this? Because to truly love someone, it needs to be a choice. God didn’t want robots down here just echoing what He wanted to hear… He wanted us to choose to Love Him and follow Him and fellowship with Him forever. People were originally created to live forever with God. However, Eve was tempted by Satan, who had rebelled against God in the heavenly realm), and then both Adam and Eve also rebelled against God by eating from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil; and sinned (sin is rebellion against God. If you are not familiar with this story, read Genesis 2 and 3.)

The result of Adam’s sin was God’s judgment on man and separation from Him because of His Holiness. From this act of rebellion, mankind inherited “original sin.” In the New Testament, Paul tells us that the wages of sin is death (Romans 6:23). One sin is enough to cause death! Because the wages of sin is death, God, in Genesis 3, shows that a life must be taken to cover the sin of Adam and Eve. Therefore, to make a temporary atonement (cover the sins for a time), God killed these animals on behalf of Adam and Eve clothing them with the skins. People began making animal sacrifices to cover their sins—an animal life for sin. There are multiple examples of this such as Abel (Gen. 4:4), Noah (Gen. 8:20), and Abraham (Gen. 22:13). The Law clearly told God’s people that without the shedding of blood, there would be no remission for sin. But what a burden to always have to kill an animal for each time you sinned! God knew that man would continue sinning, and that even the blood of animals wouldn’t completely cover ALL sin, so He had a solution, an eternal solution that would cut through time and space and reach into this world and provide the PERFECT and One Time sacrifice… the precious perfect blood of His one and only Son, Jesus Christ—far greater than any animal sacrifice—that would be sufficient to cover sin against a perfect God (Hebrews 10).

The GOOD NEWS is that Jesus Christ, our Savior, stepped into History because of God’s great love for us! Our beautiful and familiar verse today from John 3:16 tells us that God’s motivation for saving us is because of His great love for the world. This is what it means to “be saved”. We need to be saved from the punishment of sin.

When God intervened in our hopeless condition, He provided what the Bible refers to as “grace.” Grace means that we were to be rightly punished for our wrongdoings, and then the one who sentenced us to that punishment took the punishment upon Himself because of love for us. We rightly deserved death by God’s judgment. But God took that punishment upon Himself by dying in our place as Jesus Christ. He exercised that grace because of His love for us. Jesus didn’t come to the world to sentence it to death—the world was already condemned by sin. He came to save us from that sin (John 3:17). This demonstrates to us that God really is a God of love.

There is a final punishment that God will give to those who do not turn to Him. It is called hell and is a place of separation from God—and my dear friends; I assure you that hell is a real place. God never intended for people to go there. Jesus Christ came to be the final sacrifice to allow us to be saved from this penalty due to sin against a holy God. Those who put their faith in Christ will receive the FREE gift of eternal life and mercy and grace and forgiveness, not by anything you do, but because of what Christ did FOR you. Jesus was the ONLY PERSON in history that said, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” (John 14:6) Jesus, being the perfect sacrifice, offers the free gift of salvation. God loves you so much that He sacrificed His own unblemished Son to suffer the wrath against sin and die on the Cross. He calls you to repent (change your mind and turn from sinful ways) and trust in Him:

God made it simple for us to be “saved: as demonstrated in the following Bible passages:

“For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.” (Ephesians 2:8-9)

“If you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved.” (Romans 10:9-10)

It is a simple and free gift. It doesn’t matter how many steps you’ve taken away from God; it is only one step back. If you are a Christian, let today’s devotion remind you of these simple truths, and pray for God to lead you to someone you know that is not a believer and then share YOUR faith with that person. Share your testimony of what God has done in your life. TESTIFY! If you are not a Christian, then consider more deeply the claims of Jesus, and please take a few minutes to pray to God in the name of Jesus to forgive your sins and to receive Jesus Christ as the Lord of your life. Then please take some time to sit down with a Bible-believing pastor in a local church to help direct you as you begin your new life with Christ. Stop by Grace Harbor Church and someone would be honored to open up scripture and lead you to Christ, the One and ONLY way to be saved!

Shalom, sister Lahoma

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