You Can Be Saved!

This morning, in a moment in Matthew chapter seven, if you'll turn to Matthew seven, we will read from Matthew seven momentarily. But before we get to Matthew seven, I have a couple verses I'm going to show you on the screen to begin the message today. We're going to start with this one right here. It's Colossians chapter two verse eight. It's a warning from the Lord via the hand of Paul.

That the early church in Colossians needed to take to heart and we still need to today as well. We've been kind of hitting on the subject in Sunday school if you've been in Sunday school with us the last few weeks. Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit. After the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ. Let's go to the Lord in prayer once more before we continue.

Lord, we thank you for this day, this opportunity to look into your word. We pray Lord most of all that you would be exalted today in our midst. We pray that the gospel message would go forth clearly. We pray Lord that you would use your word by your spirit to bring conviction to our hearts and to give us understanding into your word and the nature of the relationship that we have by grace through faith in your son, Jesus Christ with you. Lord, bless the message today.

Lord, thank you for the opportunity to preach it and to be here with these my brothers and sisters in Christ to praise the name of Jesus. In Jesus name, we do pray. Amen. Sad to say, so many Christians today are easy targets. So many Christians and so many professing Christians, easy targets for false teachers, easy targets for cults, not so much because of their ignorance of the errors of false teachers.

But because we do not know and understand the truth. What the Bible teaches. They don't know really what they believe. Particularly concerning this subject of salvation which is all important. If you want to recognize what is false or counterfeit counterfeit, we've been looking at some of that in Sunday school, you must first get well acquainted with that which is genuine and authentic.

I've been told this by people who worked at a bank once upon a time, that the best way to recognize a counterfeit bill is to recognize an authentic and genuine bill. In other words, they're taught to recognize the real thing. This is how the real thing feels. This is how the real thing looks and if you get to know the real thing well enough, then, you're going to be able to detect when there's a counterfeit. Now, we gotten kind of lazy and they have pins now.

They just take the bill and they use that pin on it. I somewhere along the line, the counterfeiters going to figure out how to make a bill so that you can mark that highlighter what it looks like on it, it comes up the right way. But the best way to recognize that which is false and counterfeit is to become intimately close. With that which is true and genuine. But there are many Christians, many in Christianum today that are easy targets for the false teaching of the world that Paul is talking about here.

Because they don't know and understand what they believe. The false teachers use many of the same terms that we use when they talk about God and heaven and salvation but they don't all mean the same thing. They've redefined the terms. We need to know what the terms mean as they're used in scripture. How God uses the terms?

How those terms apply and to describe our relationship with God by grace through faith. In Jesus Christ. Last week, we introduced a series though I didn't say it was a series but we introduced a series on understanding our relationship with God through Christ with a message on repentance. It is only by God's grace and mercy that we sinful, depraved, and rebellious human beings are offered the opportunity to repent and turn from the path which leads to eternal damnation onto the way that leads to what? Eternal life.

Second Peter three nine, the Lord is not slack concerning his promise as some men count slackness but his long suffering to usward, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to what? Repentance. There, the word repentant is used sort of synonymous with salvation and it speaks of the point at which God has offered each and everyone of us through the sacrifice of his son on the cross, the opportunity to repent, to turn from the path that leads to destruction to the way that leads to life and that path and that way and that door is Jesus Christ, his son and a penalty that he paid for us on the cross of Calvary. Turn if you would to Matthew seven. You're already there.

We're going to read through verses 12 through 15. 12 through 15. Matthew writes, therefore, all things what so, you would that men should do unto you do do to you, do you even so to them for this is the law and the prophets. Enter you in at the what? Straight gate.

Straight gate. That means singular and narrow. For wide is the gate and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction and many there be which go in there at. Because straight is the gate and narrow is the way which leadeth unto life and few there be that find it. Beware of false prophets which come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly, they are ravening wolves.

You'll see in this passage, we often take verses thirteen and fourteen kind of out of text, out of context, though though interpreting them correctly to mean that there are two paths. There's a path that leads to what? Destruction in hell. The lake of fire. There's a path that leads to life eternal.

If we reject Jesus Christ, we will continue on the path that leads to what? Destruction. If we by faith repent and trust in Jesus Christ, then, we will turn from that path through the door which is Jesus Christ onto the narrow way which is Jesus Christ who keeps us by his power until we reach the end. Eternal life in his presence forever. There are two paths.

You're on one of those this morning. If you're on the way that leads to destruction, God offers you the opportunity to repent. And trust in his son. Unless we confess our sin and repent of it, we will eat the fruit of it forever in hell. We will all perish.

But praise God, it says in John three sixteen, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believeth in believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life. How do you get on the path that leads to life? Through faith in Jesus Christ, the son of the living God, who gave himself for you on Calvary's Cross, who rose again from the dead, and as the true and living God, offers you repentance, salvation. Praise God for the love where with he loved us and gave his son, Jesus, to be the propitiation for our sins. That is to suffer in our place, giving us the chance to be delivered from the path of destruction once and for all.

Not by works of righteousness which we have done or works of righteousness that we will do but according to his why? His mercy. His mercy, he saved us. He has delivered us. The word delivered is what I would like to focus on this morning.

Delivered. Now, you say, pastor, that that's not a word I I use often in reference to salvation. Well, you actually you use another word that basically means the same thing. Deliverance is another word that God uses to describe our standing before God as his children. We have been delivered.

We have been rescued or more commonly, we use the word saved. We have been saved. The Greek word most commonly translated save is the word sozo. What is the word mean? Well, among other things, it means delivered and rescued, saved.

Through the years, I have asked many people if they were saved. To which often, I receive an affirmative answer. Oh, yes. I'm saved. Oh, sure.

I'm saved. It seems that most people particularly in the Southern States claim to be saved. You knock out of knock on 10 doors probably eight or nine out of 10 will tell you that they are saved and it would be great if they were. Sadly, many of them are not. If you ask this question a little differently, you get a different answer.

Ask this, do you know if you died today where you would spend eternity? Do you know if you died today if you would go to heaven? Some will say yes, hesitantly. Others confidently, many will say, maybe, I hope so. I'm working on it.

I think so. I don't know. There might be a few that even say, I don't care. As you run into very few of those even in today's time. I discovered when I was a youth pastor that many young people, children, and teens were often confused about salvation when I asked this same question, are you sure if you die today?

You'd go to heaven. While having come forward in a service and sincerely praying the sinner's prayer, they were unsure of their standing before God in light of eternity. If you ask them, they were saved, they would say, yes but if you ask them, if you die today, will you go to heaven? They would say, I don't know. You see the the problem there?

If you're saved, what are you saved from? If you're saved, then you should know that you're going where? To heaven. That's right. But a lot of times, they didn't know the answer to that that question.

We as Baptist put so much emphasis on the need to be saved which we should and even on how to be saved, which we should, and sometimes, we don't spend enough time on what it means to be saved. We just say, well, you need to be saved and you you pray a prayer and this is how you're saved. Really we don't get saved by prayer, do we? We get saved by a savior. We put our faith in.

Prayer is just the way of communicating that to him. But so many people don't really understand what it means to be saved. They don't know what it is they've been rescued from or delivered from. To be saved, to be rescued, to be delivered means there must be something that you were saved from, delivered from, rescued from. I sat in chapel in my high school in Roanoke, Virginia.

Roanoke Valley Christian School. I was tenth or eleventh grader. One of the seniors got up at chapel and he told the story. He said, him and his friend had went to an area of the lake where there was a lot of rubbish and and vines and stuff in in under the water. Smith Mountain Lake which was nearby where we lived was a man made lake.

They dammed up the Smith River and they made one of the largest lakes in that area in Virginia. Maybe the largest lake in Virginia but they did that by bulldozing thousands and thousands and thousands of acres of woodland and and homes and all kinds of things to make that lake and so there were areas that were dangerous especially on some of these little inlets and there was a sign posted there. It says, don't know swimming here and my friend was with a friend of his and they were doing some fishing and his friend said, well, I want to go swimming and he said, well, no, there's a sign there. It says, don't swim here. It's dangerous.

But his friend got out of the boat anyway and he was swimming and playing around the water and he got his foot caught on something under the water and and he he started flailing and hollering in the water and he he was he was drowning and friend jumped in the water and and swam out to him. He managed to get the friend loose. Who was tangled in the mess under the water and he swam back to shore that his friend did. But he didn't make it. Now, the person who freed the other one who was in the wrong, died, and the one who was in the wrong, he made it to shore.

Now, after we all were crying and he told us, he made up the story. It wasn't real. But it made the point. There was a man who was drowning. There was a friend who cared about him.

Friend who cared enough to swim out risk his life, give his life, to save, to rescue, to deliver his friend from a death of drowning. Now, as wonderful and yet sad as that is and though that particular story was made up, I am sure that that has been the case several times. As wonderful and sad that one would give his life for another to save a friend from drowning. Jesus Christ gave his life to save us from what? To save us from sin and hell.

And if you're saved, delivered, rescued, you must be saved, delivered, rescued from something And sadly, that point is often missed. By many people. They don't understand what it is that they need to be saved from and therefore, when you ask em later, where they'll spend eternity, they don't know. The problem goes back that they don't understand what it means. To be saved.

In the Old Testament, particularly in the Psalms, the Hebrew words translated saved and delivered can refer to being saved or delivered from various things. For instance, many times, David is speaking about being delivered from his earthly enemies, particularly his foreign enemies in battle. Numbers ten nine and if you go to war in your land against the enemy that oppresseth you, then you shall blow an alarm with the trumpets and you shall be remembered before the Lord your God and you shall be saved from your enemies. Now, is is God here speaking of being saved from sin? No, he's talking about being saved from foreign enemies, from your enemies in war or in battle, from your oppressors.

Second Samuel twenty two four, I will call upon the, I will call on the Lord who is worthy to be praised, so shall I be saved from mine enemies. Psalm thirty one fifteen, my times are in thy hand, deliver me from the hand of mine enemies, and from them that persecute me. Now, David writing here understands his need to be saved from his sin. We'll look at that in a moment and though Satan and sin is our enemy in context, David here is talking about being saved from human enemies who are seeking his life, who are seeking to dethrone him, who are seeking to take over and oppress his people. That is those are the enemies here that he wants to be delivered or saved from and when you're reading through the Old Testament particularly in Psalms, you have to stop and ask the question when you're reading, what is it that David is talking about being saved from, Being delivered from and it's God interested in every facet and area of our life as his children.

Yes, he is. Is he interested in our suffering, persecution at the hands of our enemies? Yes, he is. He is interested in that and he can save us from their oppression. He can save us from persecution.

Sometimes, he allows us to deal with it as a trial for a while because we grow. He knows what he's doing. But he's interested in that. But when we talk about being saved, we are usually talking not about being saved from our enemies, not about being saved from our our illness. We're talking about being saved from something else.

That David also talks about in the Psalms. Look if you would in Psalm 39. Take your Bibles with turn to Psalm 39. We're going to look at several verses so we won't be looking at them on the screen. Psalm 39.

Psalm 39 verses seven through 11. And now Lord, what wait I for? My hope is in thee. Deliver me from all my, next word, transgressions. Now, what are transgressions?

They're sins. Transgressing God's law. Breaking his law. Sins, deliver me from all my sins. Make me not the reproach of the foolish.

I was dumb. I opened not my mouth because thou didst it. Remove thy stroke away from me. I am consumed by the blow of thine hand. When thou with rebukes does correct man for iniquity, another word for sin, thou makest his beauty to consume away like a moth and surely every man is vanity, Selah.

David here asked God to deliver him from his transgressions and from the stroke of God his correcting hand which is against David. Look if you would in Psalm 85, Psalm 85. Look at verses one through seven of Psalm 85. Lord, thou hast been favorable unto thy land. Thou hast bought back the captivity of Jacob.

Thou hast forgiven thee what? Iniquity. Iniquity of thy people. Thou hast covered all their sin. Selah, thou hast taken away all thy wrath.

Thou hast turned thyself from the fierceness of thine anger. Turn us, oh God, of our salvation and cause thine anger to toward us to cease. Will thou be angry with us forever? Will thou draw out thy anger to all generations? Will thou not receive us again that thy people may rejoice in thee?

Show us thy mercy, oh Lord, and grant us thy what? Salvation. Salvation from what? Salvation from sin and the wrath of God against them. Sometimes, God used the oppressors to express the wrath of God against them, to demonstrate his wrath but the problem ultimately was their what?

Their sin that they're asking here to be saved from in God's wrath due to it. Turn if you would to Psalm 51. Psalm 51. This is a Psalm that David wrote after his sin with Bathsheba, after he had been found out, after the Lord taught him a very very hard lesson. It is a Psalm of repentance and confession for sin And beginning in verse seven, we read, David writes, purge me with hyssop and I shall be clean.

Wash me and I shall be whiter than snow. Make me to hear joy and gladness that the bones which thou hast broken may rejoice. Hide thy face from my sins and blot out all mine iniquities. Create in me a clean heart, oh God, and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from thy presence and take not thy holy spirit from me.

Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation and uphold me with thy free spirit, then will I teach transgressors thy ways and sinners shall be converted unto thee. Deliver thee me from the blood guiltiness, oh God, thou God of my salvation and my tongue shall sing aloud of thy righteousness. So, you see, David uses this word terminology sometimes in reference to his physical enemies but he also uses it often in reference to salvation from sin and deliverance from the wrath of God that is against it. The word salvation or deliverance can be used of either circumstance. God is completely capable of performing either.

But, the greatest need is that of our deliverance from sin and hell. And when we get to the New Testament, the word salvation is almost always used of salvation from sin and its just punishment. Look if you would again to Romans chapter five. Romans chapter five. You see, it is important to ask someone following a positive response to are you saved with the question, what are you saved from?

Because not everybody knows what it is they need to be saved from. You see, some people want to be saved from alcohol and cigarettes and other destructive behaviors. And though God can deliver them from those, and though they need to be delivered from those, what they need to be delivered from is bigger. Some want to be safe from depression or misery or pain or illness or poverty. They don't understand that what God offers them is far greater than deliverance from those things.

Some want to be saved from their in laws and other demanding people. They want to be saved from difficulty in life and trouble. Some want to be saved from punishment for their criminal activities. They don't want to have to face the the just desserts of their actions on earth, and so they they want to be saved from from those. Some just want life to be a bed of roses.

Some just want to be saved Because that's what we keep telling them they need. They need to be saved. But they haven't a clue what they need to be saved from. When I was a youth pastor, we'd have kids come forward, raise their hand, come forward in a a children's service and want to be saved and we learned, you have to ask them. For sure, what it is they want to be saved from?

Because we had several kids that wanted to be saved from hurting themselves. And they didn't understand. And though God is concerned about whether they hurt themselves or not or whether they their leg hurts or they broke their arm. God is more concerned. About their broken heart and soul from sin.

And sometimes, they're not ready yet to understand that. You have to pray and continue to minister. There's some people that just want to easy escape from hell. They're not at all convicted over sin and that's a problem The reason that men must suffer in hell is because of our why? Is because of our sin and if we're not willing to confess and repent of sin, then, we're not yet ready.

To trust Jesus to save us from our sin. Romans five eight, but God commended his love toward us and that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. When did he die for us? When we were yet? Sinners.

Much more than being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him. Notice, Christ died for us when we were yet sinners that we might be saved having been justified by his punishment in our behalf, having been justified that we might be saved from God's what? God's wrath. From the con just condemnation and punishment for our sin. Matthew one twenty one, I think I have that up here on the screen.

I'll come back to these. And she shall bring forth a son, speaking of Mary, and thou shalt call his name Jesus, which means Jehovah is salvation. For he shall save his people from the Romans. Is that what it says? No.

Was that what the Jews were looking for? Yes. The vast minority of Jews were looking to be saved from the Romans. When Jesus came and he didn't offer to save them from the Romans, what did they do? They rejected him.

They had a much greater need than salvation, deliverance from the Roman Empire. They needed to be delivered from the kingdom of Satan and the power and bondage and penalty of what? Of sin. Of sin. Jesus came to save his people from their sins and not Jews only but also Gentiles and all those who put their faith in him.

He came to save them from their sin. We have violated God's law. We have done it again and again and again. The problem isn't just the actions we take. The problem is our heart.

We are sinners. We can't change it. We justly deserve. God's wrath because of our sin. Jesus took that wrath upon himself on the cross so that we might be saved from that just condemnation of sin.

And be given eternal life in him. That's why Jesus came, to save us from sin and sin's penalty. Back to John three seventeen and eighteen. For God sent not his son into the world to condemn the world. He didn't have to.

We were already what? We were already condemned. He didn't say in Jesus into the world to condemn the world but that the world through him might be saved. He that believeth on him is not no longer never to be what? Condemned.

But he that believeth not is condemned already because he hath not believe in the name of the only begotten son of God. John writes in the inspiration of the holy spirit, Jesus didn't come into the world to condemn the world. He came into the world to offer us salvation from sin and sins penalty in hell. By his death on Calvary's Cross. First Thessalonians one ten.

I'm not sure if I have that up here or not. No. I'll read it. And to wait for his son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, even Jesus which delivered us from the wrath to come. Jesus came to deliver us, to rescue us, to save us from the wrath to come.

Let's read about the wrath to come. Look, if you would in Revelation chapter 20, the wrath to come. What is it that Jesus came to save you from? He spells it out right here. He gives us a very vivid, dramatic, scary picture.

Of something we all need to be safe from. Illness, suffering, bad habits, these things in among themselves are fleeting. This life is short. The suffering that we suffer here. Though it may seem unbearable and may seem like it will never end.

Will end. And is only for a time but the suffering that we read about here because of sin, it will last how long? For all eternity. And though God is interested in your suffering physically here, Jesus Christ came to save you from the suffering that we read about here. Revelation 20 verse 11.

I saw a great white throne and him that sat on it from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away and there was found no place for them and I saw the dead, small, and great stand before God and the books were opened, another book was opened, which is the book of life. The dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books according to their works. The sea gave up the dead which rented, death and hell delivered up the dead which rent them, and they were judged every man according to their works. Now, what the writer here is doing is trying to make it clear that no one, no one will escape this judgment. Whether they were buried at sea, whether they were buried on land, whether it's the Old Testament, whether it's a New Testament, all will stand before God except.

Except those who know what? Jesus Christ as savior and have been saved from their sin. Let's continue on. Verse 14, and death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death.

And those that stood at this judgment were all cast into the lake of fire which burneth how how long? Forever and ever. It tells us another passage that the smoke of their torment ariseth forever, continually. You remember that bush on Mount Sinai that was burning but wasn't consumed? You say, well, how can there be a lake of fire and you not be consumed?

Well, that bush wasn't consumed. And those who die and are cast into the lake of fire will not be consumed by it. They will be tormented by it. Without any hope of escape. Judged according to whose works?

Their works. Their works. And be honest, if we were judged according to our works, we would all find our place in that place. But God is a loving God and God is a merciful God and God is not willing that any should what? Perish.

Perish which is what this speaks of but that all should come to repentance, salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. From their sin and this place called hell. You see, didn't read the last verse yet from Revelation 20, and that's verse 15. It says, and whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the what? Like a fire.

Do you find your name written? How do you get your name written in the book of life? You don't write it there. God does. And when does God do that?

He does that. When you come to him in repentance of sin and faith in Jesus Christ, his son. When you come to him humbly, and you receive the gift of eternal life that Jesus Christ died to buy, to pay your penalty on Calvary's Cross. Your name is written in the book of life because the wages of sin is death but the gift of God is what? Eternal life through Jesus Christ the Lord.

What is the book of life? It is eternal life in Jesus Christ and if you have eternal life in Jesus Christ, your name is written in the book of what? In the book of life. And you will not be cast into the lake of fire. Why?

Because you won't be judged for your works. You'll be judged for Jesus's works. And Jesus never sinned and Jesus died in your place on Calvary's Cross and it is his work that saves you, not yours. Sad to say, there are many people that will stand at this judgment. There are many people that will be cast into the lake of fire whose door, when I knocked on it, said, they were saved.

But they didn't know what that meant. They didn't know what it was they needed to be saved from. And they didn't really know and understand how one becomes a child of God and is saved from this condemnation and sentence in hell. Turn if you would to Romans. We're going to close from Romans chapter 10 in just a moment.

While you're turning to Romans, I want to quote from Ephesians. Ephesians two eight nine says, For by grace, that's God's giving, by grace are ye saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God not of works, lest any man should boast. We're saved by grace, God giving to us that which we don't deserve, Having done for us that which we didn't deserve. On the cross by faith in his son, Jesus Christ. Not by works, not according to our works, but according to our faith and his work.

That he did for us. In Romans 10, it says in verse nine, that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, that is that Jesus is Lord and shall believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart, man believeth under righteousness and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. Verse 13, for whosoever shall call in the name of the Lord shall be saved. What is it you need to be saved from?

Sin. You can't be saved if you are not conviction over sin. If you have not repented of sin. Recognize and confess that you are a sinner deserving of hell. For that is what Jesus came to save you from.

But if you are willing to confess your need of salvation and willing to confess that Jesus is the Lord of glory. To believe in your heart that he died on the cross to pay the price for your sins and rose again from the dead to offer you salvation in him. If you will call upon him in faith, he will what? He will save you. He will deliver you.

He will rescue you. From the bondage and power of sin. And from the penalty thereof in hell which he bore upon himself on the cross of Calvary for you. You can be saved. You must be saved.

Safe from sin and hell. That's why Jesus came, And that is the love of God for you, for our neighbors, for our friends. It is vitally important that you know that you're saved. It's also vitally important that we do our best to help them understand what it is they need to be saved from. Let's pray.

Dear God, thank you Lord for for your word today and the clear message that you present therein concerning salvation. Lord, we pray for our neighbors, our friends, our coworkers, some of them have heard the gospel in part. Some of them have heard they need to be saved. Some of them have walked an aisle even or prayed a prayer but they didn't truly understand. That they needed to be saved from sin and hell and many of them are not.

Lord, give us a burden for the lost. Give us wisdom to discern. Help us, Lord, to be grounded in the word of God that we might have a better and full understanding of the relationship that we now share with you through Jesus Christ, our savior and how that we have been saved and that salvation isn't for today but it is for all eternity. The one who saves us and keeps us and sanctifies us by his power, Jesus Christ, the son. Lord, we pray if there's one here today that's never trusted you as we sing a hymn of invitation, Lord.

They might come today. They might come as we begin. We might share with them how they might be saved and know it. In Jesus' name, we pray. Amen.