My friend, you can join a society, you can join a church, you can go through Bible lessons, catechisms, give money, and die without God. You and I have been bitten by sin and it is a mortal wound.
Is there hope? Yes, you look up at a wooden pole and you see dying there, paying the penalty for all of your sin, Jesus Christ, and you shed any self-sufficiency or good things about you, and you look to Him alone. Are you prepared for the life to come? There's a universal question that many people wonder about.
What must I do to be saved? As you know, the world offers all kinds of answers to that question. There are world religions that claim to have the answers people need. However, Jesus claimed to be the exclusive way to God, the one and only way to God.
And if that's true, then all other ways are lies. It's critical to know and understand the true gospel and the salvation God offers. That's what Stephen Davey deals with today in a message called Amazing Grace.
I want to start out our discussion by assigning a little homework right at your answer to the question. If you died and appeared at the gate of heaven where God asked why He should let you into heaven, what would you say? In other words, what do you think God would require you to say? What do you think the answer is that He would be waiting for that would open the door of heaven?
Answer that. Now that you've written your answer, let's go back to this midnight scene where the jailer asked the apostle Paul the most important question in the world. Acts 16, let's pick our story back up with verse 25.
Acts chapter 16 verse 25. But about midnight, Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns of praise to God. And the prisoners were listening to them. And suddenly there came a great earthquake so that the foundations of the prison house were shaken. And immediately all the doors were open and everyone's chains were unfastened. And when the jailer had been roused out of sleep and had seen the prison doors open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself, supposing that the prisoners had escaped. But Paul cried out with a loud voice saying, do yourself no harm.
We are all here. He called for lights and rushed in and trembling with fear he fell down before Paul and Silas. And after he brought them out, he said, sirs, what must I do to be saved? And they said, believe in the Lord Jesus and you shall be saved you and your household. And they spoke the word of the Lord to him together with all who were in his house. And he took them that very hour of the night and washed their wounds and immediately he was baptized.
He and all his household, his household, because Paul and Silas had brought them into his house and set food before them. And they rejoiced greatly having believed in God with his whole household. I felt compelled to delve a little more into the meaning of the word believe. And I'm doing so because I firmly believe that there are people in this audience as well as in our society that have been given an answer that is not biblical.
There seems to be a lot of confusion about something that God wanted to be so clear. And so I want to just sort of put the brakes on as we go through the book of Acts and I want to dive into this word believe and let's come up with the answer that can be substantiated by the word so that you can check yes, absolutely and give a biblical answer why. Now, because we are going through the book of Acts, I want to just briefly address the last paragraph of this chapter because after this we won't be coming back to chapter 16. Look at verse 35.
Let me make a couple of comments and then we'll go on. Now when day came, the chief magistrates sent their policemen saying, release those men. And the jailer reported these words to Paul saying, the chief magistrates have sent to release you, now therefore come out and go in peace. But Paul said to them, they have beaten us in public without trial, men who are Romans and have thrown us into prison and now are they sending us away secretly?
The word secretly, by the way, is a key word you ought to underline because it explains why Paul does what he does. Paul said, no, indeed, but let them come themselves and bring us out. In other words, let the magistrates come and escort us out of prison. And the policemen reported these words to the chief magistrates and they were afraid when they heard that they were Romans and they came and appealed to them. And when they brought them out, they kept begging them to leave the city. And they went out of the prison and entered the house of Lydia.
And when they saw the brethren, they encouraged them and departed. Well, what's happening here is that Paul forced the hand of the magistrates to publicly acknowledge the innocence of Paul and Silas. In fact, the magistrates had to publicly acknowledge that they had broken the law, not Paul and Silas. They had been the lawbreakers.
Why? Because they had beaten Roman citizens and that was against Roman law. Philippi was a Roman colony, which meant they had to adhere to Roman law. And if distant Rome would hear that they had beaten Roman citizens, the wrath of Rome could be aroused. And so these magistrates knew that their position and tenure was a little shaky.
And so they came. Now, Paul appealed to that simply because he didn't want to leave at night. He wanted to leave in broad daylight. In fact, he didn't want to leave the church in an unstable position. He didn't want them answering questions about, hey, I heard that your founder was put in jail and then there was some kind of earthquake and he escaped.
Is that right? He's a criminal, isn't he? Well, Paul didn't want to do that. And so he stays long enough so that they escort him out in broad daylight and admit to the public that the magistrates themselves had broken the law. This put the church on good standing.
In fact, I can't help but imagine that the magistrates would be a little extra cautious to even mess around with the church again after that. Before we leave this scene, I can't help but just look again at what an interesting church this was now. As the flag of the church is unfurled on European soil, you have Lydia, a cultured, refined, wealthy woman. You have a slave girl.
You remember her who was the voice of the python. She predicted the future under the power of demonic forces adhered to the temple of Apollo. And now you have the prison warden and his family. They're all celebrating the risen Lord together. What a manifestation of God's grace. That's what church is supposed to be all about. Now if you go back to verse 30, he discovered the warden asking that question, what must I do to be saved? Paul responds, believe on the Lord Jesus. The word believe could be defined this way. It means to place your trust in the cross work of Christ as sufficient for salvation. In other words, it isn't Jesus plus, it isn't the cross plus, it is nothing plus other than Christ alone. Now Paul says in effect, by believing you shall be saved. Not hope so, not think so, not I'll give it my best shot, not I'll get to the gate and please, I wanted to get in. He says, you shall be saved.
There isn't anything more important than that you know that, that you can answer the first question with yes, absolutely. I know. And here's why. Some time ago I was driving behind a car and it had one of those personalized license plates. I always like reading those, don't you?
Trying to figure them out. This one was easy. I ensure you, the letter U. There was no question what that guy did. There was no question what that guy was passionate about.
In fact, I'll bet you couldn't have lunch with him without him wanting to do an immediate comparison. Everybody attests to the value of insurance. You have your home insured, you have your car insured, your expensive truck insured, you have your life insured. So that should you die at 40 or 50 or 60 or 70 or 80 or whatever, there can be provision for your family when you're gone.
What about for the next 80 billion years? I found it interesting to read the story of Joseph Knapp, who is the founder of Metropolitan Life Insurance, wealthy beyond words. His wife was a believer so caught up with the truth of insurance beyond the grave that she was the one who wrote the music for a poem that her dear friend Fanny Crosby wrote, the poem that says, blessed assurance, Jesus is mine. How can you have that kind of assurance? What does it mean to believe? Well, the word believe appears, and we're just kind of going to several passages of scripture, but it appears more often in the Gospel of John probably than any other book. So I want you to turn to the Gospel of John, to a passage, chapter 3, where the word believe appears seven times in just nine verses. John was passionate that you would know that you had this eternal assurance. In fact, by the time you get to John chapter 20, verse 30, John informs the reader that he has written these things that you might believe, there's the word again, that Jesus is the Christ. In other words, God has inspired me to give you assurance that you're on your way to heaven. In fact, 1 John chapter 5, the same author, his first epistle, he says, these things have I written unto you that you may what?
That you may know that you have eternal life. You get the idea that if he got around John for five minutes, he would be asking you about your divine, eternal insurance. And it's no different in chapter 3. Let's take a closer look at what he's saying there. John chapter 3, Jesus Christ here is being visited by Nicodemus who wants to know how to inherit eternal life.
Maybe you know the story. It was to Nicodemus that Jesus Christ uttered those incredible words that all of us have probably memorized, or most of us when we were little kids say with me, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. Now, Jesus said to Nicodemus a lot of things in chapter 3. I want to give you three statements.
The first one is this. You and I were born into the wrong family. He's going to tell Nicodemus that. And you two, like Nicodemus, were born into the wrong family. Are you talking about my mother and father?
Not really. Paul amplifies that in the book of Romans in chapter 5 where he says, therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world and death through sin, and so death spread to all men for all men sin. He's telling us here that we were born into the human family, and that's the wrong family to be born into if you ever hoped to have eternal life. Because our father, Adam, is a criminal, and he was given the sentence of death. You say, but that sentence isn't mine. All you'll prove it by dying one day.
And so will I. We're all condemned because of sin. The sentence is the same as it was delivered to Adam and Eve when they were told not to eat the fruit.
If they ate the fruit, they would surely what? Die. Was God telling the truth?
Yes. How do you know? They died. How do you know that you're related to the sentence of Adam, not only the nature of Adam, but the sentence of Adam?
You'll die, and I'll die. And that's part of the bad news. In fact, if you look at what John records in chapter 3 verse 17, God did not send the world into the world to judge the world, but that the world should be saved through him. We say, Stephen, here it says, you know, Jesus didn't come into the world to judge the world, so why are you being so judgmental? The word sent is the word apostolo, which gives us our word apostle. That means he is sent with a mission. He's been given a message to deliver, and the message is not a message of judgment.
Why? Verse 18, he who believes in him is not judged, and he who does not believe has been judged, what? Already. In other words, Jesus didn't bring a message of judgment into the world because the world was already under judgment. Why condemn an already condemned human race? The world needs a savior. When Jesus was born, his birth was announced to the outcasts of society, those religiously unclean men, those shepherds, and the news was given first to them. Undo you as born this day in the city of David a what?
A judge, a teacher, a healer, a philosopher, a moralist, the founder of a new religion, a savior. The world is perishing. Every member of the human race will die. Unless the rapture occurs while we're living, we will accomplish in our bodies the sentence of our father Adam. We need a savior. Now look back at verse three there where Jesus tells Nicodemus, unless a man is born again, he'll not inherit the kingdom of God.
Why? Because the first birth placed you into the wrong family. So you have to be born again to be birthed into a new family, this time the right family. That's what he's telling Nicodemus here, and that leads me to the second statement.
Something must happen that rebirths you into the right family. Notice verse five. Truly, Jesus answered, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. Now that helps, but then it also kind of confuses. What does it mean of water?
Well, you could go to your commentaries or religious publications. You can come up with a half a dozen answers to that. It's a reference to the cleansing aspect of the new covenant. It is a reference to the cleansing of the word. It's a synonymous reference to the Holy Spirit.
Therefore, he's talking about the same thing. Or maybe it's a reference to John the Baptist and his baptism of repentance. Or maybe it's a reference to the necessity of water baptism for salvation.
Let me refer briefly to that view. Jesus was not teaching that the new birth comes through water baptism. In fact, New Testament water baptism is related to death, not birth, burial, not being born. Jesus is talking here about being born again. In other words, in order to get into the kingdom, you have to be born out of this family into a new family. And he gives us commentary, by the way, on that what that first and second birth are in verse six. Sometimes you just keep reading the Bible.
It commentates on itself. That which is born of the flesh is flesh. You can circle the word flesh, draw line up to the word water in verse five.
And there you have the explanation. That's the natural first birth and that which is born of the spirit is spirit. That's the supernatural second birth. So in Jesus's analogy here, the fleshly or natural birth corresponds to being born of water. Verse five is referring to that. You must be born physically, echudatas, out of water.
You see, that's too obvious. Everybody knows that in order to go to heaven, you have to be born one that you're thinking like a good Jew. The Jews said, all I have to do is be born into the family of Abraham and I'm in. Jesus says, okay, you have to be born.
That's true. But that first birth is not enough even for the Jew. You have to be born again into the family of God. It's always fascinated me to read and study of other religious systems that have sought to answer the question of how to be born again, how to be saved. And it's interesting to me how there are kernels of truth surrounded by a lot of religious jargon and a lot of other stuff that eventually doesn't lead people to heaven. It leads people, unfortunately, to hell. Buddhism, which is sort of becoming the religion of the elite. You're seeing movies about Buddhism and you're hearing Buddha quoted and supposedly the compassionate religion of tolerance, which is perfect for our society today. They have also addressed the issue of rebirth.
They just have many of them. They call it reincarnation. The Greeks, who lived before the time of Christ, had created what was called the mystery religions that seemed so close to the truth that would be revealed in Christ.
And yet so far away, you can see how Satan was counterfeiting the truth even before Christ came. In the Phrygian mystery religion, they would take the initiate who'd gone through all of the inductions and after he completed his initiation, they would give him a cup of milk to drink, signifying that he was, quote, a newborn baby. A fellow by the name of Apuleius, a Greek, went through the initiation of one mystery religion and later wrote, and we still have his manuscript extent, he says he underwent a voluntary death, therefore he attained his spiritual birthday and was reborn.
One of the most fascinating mystery religious ceremonies was the Taraboleum, I believe it's pronounced. This is where the candidate was taken into a pit, a deep pit, and covered over the top of this pit would be lattice, strong latticework, and they would slay a bull. They would lay the bull down on top of the latticework and the blood from the bull would drip into the pit and the initiate would literally be bathed in the blood of the dying bull.
He would emerge from that pit and he would be considered, quote, reborn for all eternity. Now, who do you think's behind all that? Deception. Well, how can we be saved? That's the question.
And then let me give you some of the abbreviated answer. First, we must profoundly believe. Then through the mystery of holy baptism, we enter into the time and space of the kingdom of heaven. Then the sacrament of chrismation endows the newly illuminated with the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Then holy confession cleanses, relieves, and assists the sinner. Then holy communion, the great gift of God to man, unites us with him and gives to us the provision for eternal life. Then the mystery of holy unction grants the salvation of body and soul. Which one is it?
It's all of them. The correct faith, the works, and the grace of the sacraments of the church lead us forward spiritually and perfect man and lead him to salvation. In other words, it's a process and you hang on until your last breath because you might not be in if you mess up along the way. As the holy fathers say, those who love God here and showed and proved their love by manner, word, and deed will continue to love him and enjoy being near him. So if you're good enough, you get to be by him. Our lifestyle therefore on earth plays an important part in our salvation.
Follow this. We should not depend exclusively on a merciful God. I do. Totally.
Because if it were not for the mercy and grace of God every waking moment, I would have violated the holiness of God and I would be condemned to hell. Something has to happen. Jesus calls it a new birth. Boy, then if you really want to muddy the waters, I just finished reading this book called Ecumenical Jihad.
Startling stuff here. Peter Kreft, a fellow that's gaining prominence and unfortunately he is being endorsed by some who've been leaders and still are considered leaders in the evangelical church. This fellow is a theologian who is an apologist. He writes basically that we should all get together for the sake of winning back Western civilization to morality. But this book takes it a step further.
This is his recent release. He has an out-of-body experience and though he is a brilliant professor at Boston College, he comes to subjective experience and he talks about his out-of-body experience where he supposedly goes to what he believes may be heaven if you've read the book. And when he arrives, the first person he meets is Buddha. And they have a conversation that goes along the lines of Buddha saying, well, you know, I was pursuing truth.
It was not along the lines of biblical truth and I didn't arrive at the atoning work of Christ, but I was pursuing truth and God understood and I'm here. Goes a little further along the line, he meets Confucius. Goes a little longer along the line, he meets Muhammad. Basically he meets them all. And the message is that we are all brothers if we indeed pursue truth. I heard John MacArthur talk about this book when I was listening to him in person in a conference and he said what I'm about to say and I couldn't believe it so I went and got the book.
Because on the back, among others, you have an endorsement by a man named J.I. Packer who says, among other things, what if he is right? If he is right, Peter Kreft, if the mystery religions are right, if Buddhism is right, if the Orthodox Church and its works are right, then Jesus Christ is a liar. Because he made the exclusive claim that there are not many roads to God, there is only one. In fact, he said I am it. The incarnate God said I am the way, the truth, and the life.
No one gets to the Father except by me. And that's the offensive nature of Christianity, ladies and gentlemen. Because if Jesus Christ is right, then everyone else is wrong. If he is the way, then everything else is not the way. If this is the Gospel, then anything else is not the Gospel. If this tells you how to get to heaven, then any other way is the way to hell, right? Frankly, we would never treat any other truth or science like we seem to treat spiritual truth.
I never thought of going up to my math teacher and saying, look, could you give me credit for getting close? Let me make one more statement. Salvation is not a process or a combination of good works and faith, but a transaction that takes place once for all between you and the Savior.
How do you make that transaction? Well, we could spend so much time, but let me try to be as clear and brief as I can at the same time. Look at verse 14. Jesus gives us an illustration, which is wonderful because we can kind of hang our hats on stories, can't we? As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes may in him have eternal life.
Something happened in the Old Testament where the Israelites were rescued from certain death, and Jesus says, that was an illustration of me. Now let's go back to Numbers 21, shall we? Numbers chapter 21, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers. Numbers 21, five, and the people spoke against God and Moses. Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness?
For there is no food and no water and we loathe this miserable food. And the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people and they bit the people so that many people of Israel died. So the people came to Moses and said, we have sinned because we've spoken against the Lord and you intercede with the Lord that he may remove the serpents from us.
And Moses interceded for the people. Then the Lord said to Moses, make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole or a wooden pole or standard. And it shall come about that everyone who is bitten, when he looks at it, he shall live. And Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on a pole.
And it came about that if a serpent bit a man, when he looked to the bronze serpent, he lived. Why not develop some medicine? Why not give them the formula for an antidote? Why not tell them to have the Israelites work a little bit?
They deserved it because of the way they belly ached. Why not give them something to do which would satisfy the natural instinct of men and women everywhere to work on behalf of their own cure? There is something natural about wanting to help God provide the solution. In fact, we're told they were not told to make an antidote for the snakebite, which is indicative of the greater fact that there is no human remedy for sin, none, that we can create. Religion works.
In fact, religion and human nature have a hard time admitting that, right? Donald Gray Barnhouse writes about this passage, some interesting words. He said, in the religious fashion of our day, had the serpents come in our day, there would have been a rush to incorporate the, quote, society for the extermination of the fiery serpents. There would have been badges for the coat lapel, cards for district workers, secretaries for organizational branches, pledge cards and mass rallies.
There would have been a publication office and a weekly journal to tell of the progress of the work. There would have been photographs of heaps of serpents that had been killed by the faithful workers, all of them feverishly trying by human effort to overcome the serpent's bite of sin. Let us accompany one of the zealous workers as he might take a pledge card into the tent of a bitten man. The man had been bitten and the poison had already affected his limbs. He lies in feverish agony, the glaze of death already coming to his eyes. The zealous member of the society for the extermination of fiery serpents tells him of all that has been done to combat the serpents and urges the man to join the society. The dying victim fumbles in his pocketbook for money and then takes a pen in his hand.
His fingers are held by the worker who helps him form his signature on the pledge and membership card and the man signs in full and then dies. That is a classic illustration of religion ladies and gentlemen. My friend, you can join a society, you can join a church, you can go through Bible lessons, catechisms, give money, get baptized when you're young, middle aged, old, and die without God. You and I have been bitten by sin and it is a mortal wound. Is there hope?
Yes, you look up at a wooden pole and you see dying there, paying the penalty for all of your sin, Jesus Christ, and you shed any self-sufficiency or ambition or good things about you and you look to him alone. All of us either have or can receive God's gift of eternal life given to us as a result of God's amazing grace. This is Wisdom for the Heart with Stephen Davey. We're in a series from our Vintage Wisdom Library out of the Book of Acts.
We're going to continue through this series on our next broadcast. Between now and then you can learn more about us by visiting our website at wisdomonline.org. There you'll find the complete library of Stephen's Bible teaching ministry. Whether you're looking to deepen your understanding of a specific book of the Bible or catch up on recent broadcasts, our website has a wealth of resources to help you grow in your faith. Visit wisdomonline.org today, then join us back here next time for more Wisdom for the Heart.
