Explaining Salvation

There is nothing more important than

Understanding Salvation

and

Explaining Salvation to others .

Note we also have pages called

Prayer for Salvation

and

Understanding the Trinity

There is nothing more important

than making sure:

You are right with God!

And those you love are right with God!

You may also want to read a Bible devotion about this subject.

 Trusting God.

Taking God Seriously

God wants us to listen to him

and

take his Word - the Bible - seriously.

Proverbs 13:13 TLB

says,

“Despise God's word

and

find yourself in trouble.

Obey it and succeed.”

Most people believe there is a God.

And most people trust God's word – at least a little.

But the main question is:

Do you trust God enough to obey what he says?

 

Another vital question is:

Do you believe

what God says about salvation?

We must be Born Again

Jesus tells us that we must be born again

to get to heaven.

In John chapter 3, Jesus is talking to Nicodemus.

In verse 5 Jesus said,

“Most assuredly, I say to you,

unless one is born again,

he cannot see the kingdom of God.”

 

Becoming born again means:

a person repents of all sins

and acknowledges that

on the cross

Jesus

(the son of God  John 1:1)

paid the price for our sins,

and then he asks Jesus

to be his Savior AND Lord of his life.

In order to go to heaven,

you must make Jesus

Your Savior…..

but the Bible also tells us that

– to be saved -

you must also

Make Jesus your Lord.

Making Jesus your Lord

means that

you try

to obey what the Bible says.

Sometimes people do not understand

what being born again is all about.

Some people

think

all they have to do is say a prayer to God

and believe that there is a God.

So...

Some people think that they are going to heaven

and

they may not be.

  Jesus tells us that there are people

who will think

they are going

to heaven

and they are not. 

In Matthew 7:21 NKJV. Jesus said,

“Not everyone who says to Me

'Lord, Lord,' shall

enter the kingdom of heaven,

but

he who does the will of My father in heaven.

Many will say to Me in that day,

'Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in your name,

cast out demons in Your name,

and

done many wonders in Your name?'

And then I will declare to them,

'I never knew you'

depart from Me

you who practice lawlessness!'”

 

So Jesus tells us that being born again is more than

good deeds.

Anyone can do good deeds.

And Jesus said that just calling him “Lord”  - is not enough.

We need to make him

Lord

of our life.

Those who refuse to accept him as

Savior and Lord

will be separated from him forever in hell.

We are saved by Faith and not by Works.

But

if we ARE saved - 

Our commitment to God will result

in works

of obedience.

We are saved by faith and not by works.

But works

are

the evidence

that we truly are born again.

Doing Works means:

We will follow the righteousness

that is taught

to us in the Bible.

Righteousness means Right Living.

If

there is no

change

in our behavior,

we need to be alarmed.

How can anyone follow Jesus and not change?

-

The song below:

God runs to you

when you sincerely

change your heart and make him Lord.

 

To be born again means that we become spiritually alive.

When we are spiritually alive,

we begin to act more and more like Jesus.

In the book of James,

the Bible explains to us that

Faith without works is dead .

When we are truly born again, we become spiritually alive…..

and

we will show that we are spiritually alive

by becoming

more and more obedient to the word of God

BUT

if we have no works

then

we need to be concerned

that something is wrong.  

 

1 John 3:9-10a TLB explains it this way:

The person who has been born into God’s family

does not make a practice of sinning,

because

now God’s life is in him;

so

he can’t keep on sinning

for

this new life has been born into him and controls him –

he has been born again.

So now we can tell who is a child of God

and who belongs to Satan.”  

 

But if we do

sin,

1 John 1:9 tells us

that if we confess our sin,

he is faithful

and just to forgive us our sin and cleanse us

from all unrighteousness.

Jesus said...

‘These people show honor to me with words,

    but their hearts are far from me.

Matthew 15:8 NCV

Where is your heart?

Was Jesus talking about you?

1 John 2:3-6  TLB says,

“And how can we be sure that we belong to God?

By looking within ourselves:

are we really trying to do what he wants us to?

Someone may say,

‘I am a Christian; I am on my way to heaven;

I belong to Christ.’

But 

if he doesn’t do what Christ tells him to,

he is a liar.

But those who do what Christ tells them to will learn to

love God more and more.

That is the way to know

whether or not you are a Christian.

Anyone who says he is a Christian should live

as Christ did.”

Being Born-Again
Changes us

Jesus said,

"Unless you are born again,

you cannot see the kingdom of heaven."

When we get born again,

our character begins to change.

When we are born again,

we cannot keep doing the sins that we have always done.

Our character is not just

who we are when people are watching

but it is also who we are when no one is watching –

except God.

ADDICTIONS

Note:

With some sins  - such as an addiction,

we become ensnared

and

it takes a process to get free of it.

You may fall back into that sin while you are working

to become strong in the Lord

but all the while

you are feeling God’s conviction,

and

you are seeking and working to be free of that sin.

This is where spiritual warfare comes in. We learn spiritual warfare techniques that will strengthen us against sin.

(Note that I have spiritual warfare prayers and teaching on my website.)

God helps us to renew our mind and as we renew our mind, we become stronger.

Renewing our Mind

God wants us to renew our mind

by reading the Bible.

When we renew our mind, we become stronger. And we begin to think like God.

And then we will want to please God in our own personal life by obeying the Bible.

Renewing our mind is a lifelong process. But if you haven’t changed since you were born again, then that is something to be concerned about.

After we are born again, we HEAR God convicting us of sin AND we will begin to respond to that conviction by changing our behavior. God gives us the power to change.

We learn HOW to actively

come against sinning.

We also begin to think ahead and keep ourselves

from being put in certain circumstances.

We learn to read and reread scripture

about what we are struggling with

so we can gain strength to overcome sin.

We become a stronger Christian

as God becomes our teacher through reading his word.

In Luke 14:27-28  NKJV-

Jesus talks about salvation.

Jesus says,

“And whoever does not bear his cross

and come after Me

cannot be

My disciple.

For which of you intending to build a tower,

does not sit down first

and

count the cost,

whether he has enough to finish it.

Verse 33:

“So likewise,

whoever of you does not forsake all

that he has

cannot be My disciple.”

 

Luke 13:23-29  New Century Version

“Someone said to Jesus,

“Lord, will only a few people be saved?”

Jesus said,

“Try hard to enter through the narrow door,

because

many people will try to enter there,

but

they will not be able.  

When the owner of the house gets up and

closes the door,

you can stand outside and knock on the door

and say,

‘Sir, open the door for us.’

But he will answer,

‘I don’t know you or where you come from.’

Then you will say,

‘We ate and drank with you, and

you taught in the streets of our town.’  

But he will say to you,

‘I don’t know you or where you come from.

Go away from me, all you who do evil!’  

You will cry and

grind your teeth with pain when you see

Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and all the prophets in God’s

kingdom,

but you yourselves thrown outside.”

 

 

Isaiah 55:6-7 NKJV instructs us,

“Seek God while he may be found.

Call upon Him while He is Near.

Let the wicked forsake his way,

and the unrighteous man his thoughts;

Let him return to the Lord.

And He will have mercy on him and

to our God, for He will abundantly pardon.”

 

God is ready to forgive you

when you repent

and

make Jesus your Savior AND your Lord.

Being born again and making Jesus your Savior

happens in one day.

Making

Jesus your Lord

is

something

we need to do intentionally and continually.  

Jesus explains it

in

Matthew 16:24-25, Mark 8:34

and a third time in

Luke 9:23.

 

Matthew 16:24-25 says,

“Then Jesus said to His disciples,

“If anyone wishes to come after Me,

he must deny himself

and take up his cross and follow ME.”

 

Mark 8:34 says....

And he summoned the crowd with His disciples, and said to them, 'If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me.'”

 

Luke 9:23 says.....

And he was saying to them all, 'If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me.'”

All three verses say the same thing: 

Jesus said, “Pick up your cross and follow me.”

 

What does

picking up your cross and following Jesus -

 really mean?

 

The Cross represents

a Lifestyle. 

It is the willingness to follow Jesus in your decisions and in your actions. It is a commitment to stay close to Jesus.

 It is a firm commitment and  dedication to follow

- to obey -

Bible.

 

True Christians are seeking to obey God.

They do not live in sin.

They may sin

but they do not live in sin.

In other words,

they do not justify sin or

make a habit of sinning in an area of conduct.

Instead,

when God convicts them of sin, they turn away from sin.

If you rebelliously refuse to repent and obey the Bible,

here is what God says to you:

“But those who keep on sinning

are against God,

for every sin

is done against the will of God.”

1 John 3:4 TLB  

Then it goes on to say,

“So if we stay close to him,

obedient to him,

we won’t be sinning either;

but as for those who keep on sinning,

they should realize this:

They sin because they have never really known him

or become his.

Oh, dear children,

don’t let anyone deceive you about this:

if you are constantly doing what is good,

it is because you

are good, even as he is.

But if you keep on sinning,

it shows that you belong to Satan, who

since he first began to sin has kept steadily at it.

But the Son of God

came to destroy these works of the devil.”

1 John 3:6-8 TLB

 Think about your life.

Are you following Jesus?

Are you hearing God convicting you of sin? 

Do you excuse sin or make a practice of sinning?

or

Are you seeking to please God

by obeying his Word?

Salvation Prayer

If you are not sure that you are saved,

please give your life to Jesus today

and say this prayer with me.

(The prayer doesn't save you. Following Jesus is the fruit that says that you meant your prayer of commitment.)

Heavenly Father,

I hear you convicting me of sin. I know you want me to give my life to you.

Today I am confessing that I have sinned, I repent of my sins,  and I believe that Jesus died on the cross for my sins. I accept Jesus….. as my Savior and my Lord. I give you my life to you. I WILL follow you.

Amen

(You might also like to visit our Salvation Prayer page.)

I rejoice with all of you who said that prayer! I'd love you to send me a note from my contact page and tell me that you prayed to receive Jesus as Savior and Lord.

If you have family who are not saved, make sure that they truly know the truth of what the Bible says about salvation.

Heaven is real, but hell is also real.

Encourage those you love…. to draw closer to God and remind them to make sure they are saved - some people think that if they believe: there is a God who wrote the Bible then: they are saved. As the Bible says, "Even the demons believe that."

Note that

We have a new page called:

Beware of the NEW Jesus

The New False Grace Message:

Note that many preachers and teachers are beginning to fall away from the true salvation message.

Many call it the new grace message.

Those who teach this message essentially say that it really doesn't matter if we continue to sin.

They imply that today God really isn't all that upset about people sinning. They focus on teaching about the love of God and try to avoid all the multitude of verses that talk about God expecting us to try to obey him.

The False Grace message says FALSE things like:

• Don't try to obey God. Don't try -  just trust.
• The moment we try to please God, we are in the flesh.
• If we try to please God, we put ourselves back under the law.
• Trying to obey God is mixing law and grace.
• Trying to obey God is a dead work and dead works are sin.
  

The above words are a total twisting of the message of Jesus.

The false grace message teachers say  or imply  that we don't have to obey the commands and instructions in the Bible. Many even say that all the words of Jesus are not for us today because Jesus was just preaching to unsaved Jews and we are saved Gentiles and Jews. They use grace as an excuse to sin and tell people they don't have to stop living a sinful lifestyle.

BUT their words are not true.....God didn't send Jesus as our excuse to sin BUT instead, as our loving answer when we do sin -  as we all do sin at times.

We must all be careful not to allow the wonderful grace of God to draw us to the conclusion that we can ignore all the commands of God that teach us to grow spiritually and that tell us to seek to turn away from sin.

I've had friends who have listened to the false grace message and as a result they have totally turned from the true Gospel. From my observation, once the false grace message gets hold of a person, it is hard for anyone to help that person see the truth again. 

Important Note:

If you confront people who teach the false grace message,

they will assure you that they are not saying that sin is ok.

Yet

everything they teach contradicts that.

Take notice that

they are very uncomfortable when people talk

about

the importance of obeying God.

This "falling away" was predicted in the Bible in many places:

Jude 1:3-4 AMP:

Beloved, my whole concern was to write to you in regard to our common salvation. [But] I found it necessary and was impelled to write you and urgently appeal to and exhort [you] to contend for the faith which was once for all handed down to the saints [the faith which is that sum of Christian belief which was delivered verbally to the holy people of God].

For certain men have crept in stealthily gaining entrance secretly by a side door. Their doom was predicted long ago, ungodly (impious, profane) persons who pervert the grace (the spiritual blessing and favor) of our God into lawlessness and wantonness and immorality, and disown and deny our sole Master and Lord, Jesus Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed One)

Also see 2 Peter chapter 2.

Matthew 5:19 says,

"Whoever therefore breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches men so shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven."

What happens to those who never hear?

One final note:

What happens to those who never hear?

In the United States and in many countries around the world, there are ample opportunities to read a Bible and learn about the truth of Jesus Christ.

But some of you may wonder

what happens to people

who have never had a chance

to know the truth about Jesus.

In Romans chapter one it tells us that the eternal future of those people is based on the knowledge they had.

That does not apply

to those who have had

the opportunity to read the Bible

and

just ignored that opportunity.

Seek the Lord while he may be found

Isaiah 55:6 NKJV

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