Post by garywalker on Jan 28, 2011 15:57:01 GMT -5
Are you saved?
by Gary L. Smith
do you have a Saviour?
What is the gospel?
Do you know where you are going?
The bible says that saved people go to Heaven and lost people go to Hell.
The bible says that the gospel is the good news that if you trust Jesus Christ as your Lord and Saviour that God will save you.
The bible says that there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself a ransom for all.
A ransom is the price that has to be paid to redeem someone.
The bible says that we have redemption through His blood, even the forgiveness of sins. Have you committed sins? Then the bible says you need a Redeemer. What is the gospel? The gospel is that Christ died for your sins. He was delivered for your offenses and was raised again for your justification.
The gospel is not to keep the commandments. Nobody ever has. Then what are the commandments for? The Law was given to show you that you need a Saviour. By the works of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight, the bible says, for by the law is the knowledge of sin. The law makes you know what sin is. Adam sinned. By one act of one man, sin entered the world and death by sin. So death passed to all men for that all have sinned. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Hence, all need a Saviour to save them from their sins.
The gospel is not to ask Jesus into your heart. The gospel is to trust that Christ died for your sins. The gospel is not to walk the aisle for Jesus but to acknowledge that Jesus Christ walked up Calvary’s hill and was nailed to the cross in your place. Crosses are for criminals and you are the criminal. Your crimes are against a holy and righteous God. So Christ took your place, and died in your stead on the cross. You need, not only A saviour, but THE SAVIOUR, the Lord Jesus Christ. Are you saved, or are you just religious but LOST?
Salvation is not to pray through at the alter but to simply trust that Christ got through to God for you, in your behalf. You don’t have to go to the alter to be saved, you have to trust Jesus Christ as your Saviour to be saved. There is no other name given under Heaven among men whereby we must be saved. Not Mary, not the Pope, not the Preacher, not a religious leader with a big following, but ONLY Jesus Christ. He alone died for your sins and rose again for your justification.
Salvation is not to repent of your sins and clean up your act. The bible says that there are none that are good and none that doeth good. So you are no good and you don’t do good and you can’t be good, you still need a Saviour, Jesus Christ. He is the only way. Christ say I AM the way, the truth and the life. Do you want life? Then get Christ and you will have life. The bible says to a saved individual that when Christ who is our life shall appear then shall we also appear with him in glory.
Salvation is not in joining the church or shaking the preacher’s hand. Salvation is in Jesus Christ. If you want life, get Christ as your Saviour, believe on him and trust in him and God will save you. You don’t have to go to a religious meeting in order to find salvation. You can be saved right now without lifting a finger or going anywhere. Salvation is not in going, or doing, or saying, but in trusting. Are you trusting Jesus Christ alone for salvation?
Salvation is not in water baptism. Salvation is in the baptism Christ was baptized with. He was baptized into death and it was your death he was identified with. The wages of sin is death, and Christ died for your sins. He took the payoff. God made him to be sin for you. The issue is not getting wet but getting saved and you can’t get saved in water, but only in Christ. Trust Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit will do the baptizing INTO the body of Christ. For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body. There is one Lord, one faith and one baptism. The Holy Spirit does the baptizing today, not men. If you are trusting your baptism for salvation then you are not trusting Jesus Christ to have done the work of salvation. Getting water baptized might be a sign…that somebody is trusting in his own efforts and not in Christ’s work on the cross. He said, “it is finished.”
Salvation is not goose bumps. The bible never says “feel on the Lord Jesus Christ,” it says BELIEVE on him. People say, “well I know what I felt.” Yes, but do you know who you are trusting? Salvation is a faith issue, not a feeling issue. When your faith follows the facts then the feelings fall in line. But when your faith starts following your feelings and ignores the facts then what you really have is an emotional upheaval, not salvation. Salvation is in the FACT that Christ died for your sins, all of your sins, and by trusting those facts, God will receive you, no matter what.
Salvation is not in water, or wafers, or Wesley or Calvin or Allah or Budda or Mary or a holy cow. Salvation is in Jesus Christ. Salvation is not by works but by faith. Faith in what Christ did for you, not in what you are doing, or are going to do for him. Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us.
Deliverance is not salvation and healing is not salvation. Just because you cured a bad habit doesn't mean that you are saved. Just because you were sick and got well doesn't mean you are saved. Salvation is only by trusting Jesus Christ and what he did, on the cross, for you. When you trust the Lord alone for salvation then you are saved. The bible says that the word of God standeth sure and hath this seal: The Lord knoweth them that are his. In other words a saved person is a sealed person. Sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise. The Lord will never say to a saved person, “depart from me ye workers of iniquity, I never knew you.” The bible says he DOES know you and that he has sealed you unto the day of redemption. So a sealed person is a saved person. Are you sealed?
What is the evidence of your salvation? The evidence of salvation is not speaking in tongues. You can't look at a person, or watch a person and tell whether or not he is saved. Saved people look just like lost people. They all look the same, and sometimes they all act the same. So how can you tell if a person is saved? By his testimony. By the words that come out of his mouth. You shall know them by their fruits. Fruits are words. They are not physical actions. Jesus said “by your words you will be justified and by your words you will be condemned.” Jesus said the mouth speaks what the heart is full of. So what is your heart full of?
Could you stand up somewhere and give a testimony of your salvation. If somebody asked you, are you saved, what would you say? A salvation testimony is not a colorful account of all the bad things and horrible experiences you have had in your life. A salvation testimony would be something along these lines. I was a lost, doomed and damned sinner, lost, on my way to Hell, without God. I am the criminal. I am the thief, the drunk, the murderer, the back stabber, the fornicator, the gossiper. I am no good. I don't do any good. I can't do any good. But somebody shared the gospel with me. The word of truth, the gospel of my salvation, and I realized that it’s not about me. It’s about Jesus Christ. And I realized that all that I was, all that I am and all that I ever will be, sinful, ungodly and the enemy of God, that God made Christ to be all of that for me. Christ died for me and all that I am. Christ died because I am a sinner and I commit sins. Sinful I was born and sinful I will be. But Christ died for all my sins, and the proof that God has forgiven me is that he raised Christ from the dead. I trust Jesus Christ as my Saviour, my only Saviour. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.
We don't change God's message -- His message changes us.