There is a problem and you may not even know what it is.
You’re probably here because you heard that you need to be saved. What are we talking about when we say salvation or that your lost.
If I were to throw a life preserver to you and you thought that you were swimming in a pool and everything was fine, you might be annoyed with me. However, if you looked around and saw that you were in the middle of an ocean with no hopes of making it to shore and I threw a life preserver to you, you’d be grateful and grab onto it.
Or if you thought you were taking a stroll in the park and a bunch of search and rescue people came out of the trees and said that they found you, you’d probably be pretty annoyed, but if you had been wandering in a forest for quite some time and couldn’t find your way out and the rescuers found you, then you’d probably be grateful and follow them out.
The problem is that you have sin in your life and the penalty for that sin is death. We all have this problem, in fact, we were born with this problem.
You might be thinking, "I'm not a sinner", "I'm a good person", but are you really? If you think you're good, you need to look at God's perfect standard.
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Have you ever stolen anything, regardless of value?
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Have you ever told a lie?
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Have you ever committed adultery even if it's only in your mind?
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Have you ever used God's name as a curse word?
Well, these are only 4 of God's 10 Commandments, and so far none of us are looking very "good".
What does the Bible say about these sins?
Romans 3:23 says for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God
In other words, there is a perfect standard that God has, and by our actions and attitudes we have failed to meet that standard over and over again.
Romans 3:10-18 says as it is written: “None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.” “Their throat is an open grave; they use their tongues to deceive.” “The venom of asps is under their lips.” “Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness.” “Their feet are swift to shed blood; in their paths are ruin and misery, and the way of peace they have not known.” “There is no fear of God before their eyes.”
Everyone, including you and me, are in this category of being unrighteous or not being right, for a multitude of reasons, but the primary reason is because we don’t understand God and we don’t fear God.
Romans 6:23 says For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Again, as I had said before, the wages of sin or what we’ve earned through our sin is death. This isn’t just physical death, but a forever death in hell where there is nothing but decay, torture, and separation, forever.
Romans 6:23 finishes with but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
This free gift of eternal life was paid for by Jesus.
Romans 5:8 says but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
Sin requires a payment, a perfect payment, the kind of payment that you and I could never pay for even with an eternity in hell.
Imagine for a second that you had committed a great crime and was brought into the court room and the judge had just fined you 10 million dollars or go to prison. You have no way to pay that fine, and just before the bailiff is about to take you away, someone in the courtroom stands up and says “I’ll pay his fine”.
Jesus had the ability to pay our fine because he was sinless, perfect, he met God’s standard and when he died on the cross for us he took our penalties and paid for them and when he rose again he showed that he also conquers death and that in him we will also overcome death.
How can we be part of this free gift?
Romans 10:9 says because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
If you are willing to follow Jesus as your Lord and confess that he is Lord to others, believing in your heart that his death and resurrection is true and all that is needed to save you, then you will be saved.
There is no magical prayer or thing to say to be saved, but if you want God’s attention, you will have to trust in everything He is and call out to him for mercy.
Romans 10:13 says For “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”
This salvation doesn’t just take away the penalty of sin, but also the power that sin has over your life, and puts us in a new relationship with God as well.
Romans 5:1 says Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.
We are no longer enemies of God, be we have peace with Him.
Romans 8:1 says There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
We don’t have to worry about what we’ll say for ourselves on judgement day because we will not be condemned to hell for our sins. Jesus paid for our past sins, our sins we commit today and the sins we will commit in the future.
Romans 8:38-39 says For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
We not only have peace with God, but He actually loves us. Nothing can separate us from that relationship with God. Not death, or something in this life, not angels, not rulers or their governments, nothing in our present or anything in the future, nothing more powerful than us, nothing in the mountains or sky or valleys or the seas, or anything else will ever separate the love relationship that God now has with us.
Salvation is the first step in following Jesus. Trying to go any further without salvation is like missing the first step on a flight of stairs, all the other steps are a disastrous failure.
If you would like some suggestions as to where to go from here, I would humbly suggest the following.
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Find a good church that welcomes new believers
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If you don’t already have a Bible, I would suggest buying an ESV or a New King James Bible
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Carefully read the gospel of John and the book of Romans in your Bible to learn more about this great salvation and your new relationship with God
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Tell others about your salvation and about how they can be saved as well
The Discipleship Center is meant to be an on-campus learning opportunity, but we would also be glad to help you in any way we can including the free classes that we use with our clients.
