Oh say, friend! It's so good of you to invite us into your home for Bible study. We know how many choices of programs you have-- and you have chosen ours! We’re glad! And we are thankful. And we pray we will both be blessed by our Bible study today.
Let me begin by reading you a letter. I’m not going to tell you who wrote it -- or even from which state it came. That isn’t important; its importance is in its contents. We don’t read people’s names and people’s mail without their consent on the TV, and so we are going to keep this anonymous. He says, “I am writing for your assistance today as I am totally confused about the many teachings about the Christian faith that I have seen or heard on cable TV and radio. I must know what is ‘the true and only gospel of Jesus Christ?’ Where in the New Testament can it be found by chapter and verse? Can you please help me? People tell me that salvation is a simple matter but when someone tries to tell me what it is, they don’t seem to know themselves. I am mystified that so many radio and television ministers claim that they are taking the ‘gospel of Jesus Christ’ to the whole world or that they are preaching ‘the only true gospel.’ They say ‘gospel’ means ‘good news’, but is there one true gospel that can save a person today? Besides believing in God, please tell me what else a person must do to ‘be saved?’ I don’t think that God would have purposely made salvation a complex matter if He really wanted people to be saved. Please tell me the true gospel with one answer please, with chapter and verse? I would also like to know which Bible version, in your opinion, is the most accurate and the one that I should read. I beg you not to add my name to any mailing list, if you have one.” And we don’t have one. So, and then he closes with “Sincerely.”
Well, I have mailed the gentleman a copy of this-- my reply. It’s a response to an almost identical letter to which I devoted one entire program earlier this year. I’m repeating that reply or that program for this man today. If you failed to hear or to see it and you would like a free printed copy-- or an audio cassette tape or a CD of it, simply address your request to In Search of the Lord’s Way P.O. Box 371, Edmond, OK 73083; or by e-mail, searchtv@searchtv.org. It is on our web site at searchtv.org, also.
Everything is free here. We are not a money-making enterprise, but we are a ministry of some of the churches of Christ in the service area of this station. Oh, yes, I nearly forgot our toll-free telephone number: 1-800-321-8633. You may use it to make your requests, if you like. Ken Helterbrand’s going to lead us now as we sing, and then I will be back for Bible reading and prayer.
We are reading from Acts, the 16th chapter, beginning at verse 25. “But at midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them. Suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken; and immediately all the doors were opened and everyone’s chains were loosed. And the keeper of the prison, awaking from sleep and seeing the prison doors open, supposing the prisoners had fled, drew his sword and was about to kill himself. But Paul called with a loud voice, saying, Do yourself no harm, for we are all here. Then he called for a light, ran in, and fell down trembling before Paul and Silas. And he brought them out and said, Sirs, what must I do to be saved? So they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved, you and your household. Then they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in his house. And he took them the same hour of the night and washed their stripes. And immediately he and all his family were baptized. Now when he had brought them into his house, he set food before them; and he rejoiced, having believed in God with all his household.” And now let us pray to God. Our Father, in Jesus’ name we come to You with thanksgiving in our hearts for the passage that we have just read that so clearly demonstrates what a person must do in order to be saved. We are thankful for this incident in Your word that is so near to what we have had read in our letter this morning. And we pray that You will bless us in our study of this passage. Amen!
I sensed a measure of urgency in the letter I read to you awhile ago, didn’t you? I believe the writer is desperately searching, and honestly searching, for the true-- the biblical answer to his question about how to be saved from past life of sin, and to enjoy the forgiveness of God and the blessings of a new life in His Son, Jesus Christ. Don’t you? And isn’t it truly a sad, sad condition that exists in Christendom today that such a one gets such a variety of confusing and contradicting and conflicting answers to that simple question? I know what he is talking about. Those stations, networks and satellite programs that he mentioned in his letter, which I didn’t read on the air, are all religious stations, networks, TV and radio stations. He wanted and is searching for the Bible answer. I’m committed to giving him the Bible answer. You see, well, what you probably didn’t know is that my dear mother was a member of one denomination; my good father was a member of another. And I know what it is to be to be torn asunder by different beliefs and ways to heaven. I once walked in that man’s boots. That is one reason I gave my life to preaching the gospel. I wanted at that time-- and I am still committed to telling people what I had to dig out of the Bible for myself-- the salvation of Jesus Christ, and the way that He said it. Sir, I hope you are hearing me now and if you are, and others who are hearing me, please, please listen carefully.
When Jesus was risen from the dead and was about to ascend to the Father, He charged His apostles, saying, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned.” And that is the reading of Mark 16:15 and 16.
Later the Holy Spirit inspired Luke to write the story of their obedience to that command. And it’s the fifth book of your New Testament; it is called “Acts” or “Acts of Apostles.” They were to begin in Jerusalem, and go throughout all of Judea, to Samaria, and then to the whole world. And the story begins in chapter two in Jerusalem. They were scattered by persecution (Acts 8 and 1) and in chapter eight, verse four, it’s written that “they went everywhere preaching the word.” And God, not only gave the answer to our enquirer’s question, in that same book of Acts, He gave example after example after example of how people who asked it, responded when given the answer. It is an extremely interesting book. Well, you need to read every word of it.
We are studying in the 16th chapter today-- because there was a man there who asked that very same question. The apostle Paul along with Silas as a co-worker, the two of them were on what is often called Paul's second missionary tour. They visited some of the churches that Paul and others had established on his first tour; and those churches were strengthened by their visit and their teaching; they were strengthened in the faith and increased in numbers daily (Acts 16 and 4). And in keeping with the apostle’s world vision for Christ, according to Romans 15:20, he wanted to go into Asia and then to Bithynia, but he was restrained by the Holy Spirit in some way. He came to the seaport town of Troas where he had a vision of preaching the gospel over in Europe. It had never been done before. Paul liked to preach where Christ had never been preached (Romans 15:20). So, he quickly rose and boarded the ship to cross the Aegean Sea to the Macedonian city of Neapolis and from there to Philippi.
On the Sabbath day he found some Jewish women worshiping out by the riverside there in Philippi. He preached Christ to them and one of them in particular by the name of Lydia, a seller of purple, a business woman who was there at the time, and her family were baptized. Paul and Silas, and Luke was with them by this time; and so they kept on teaching the people. Their ministry caused such an uproar that Paul and Silas were arrested, were mercilessly beaten with many stripes and then thrown in jail. And this is where our text begins.
Instead of being depressed and discouraged, as we might suppose anyone would be under those circumstances, verse 25 tells us that at midnight, Paul and Silas were singing hymns of praise to God and the other prisoners were listening to them; when suddenly, a great earthquake shook the very foundation of the prison house! And all the doors were flung ajar and every prisoner's bands were loosed! Verses 27 and 28 tell us that the jailor, thinking his prisoners had surely fled, and knowing that he would have to give account for that, and maybe it would cost him his life, was about to commit suicide. "But Paul cried with a loud voice, Do yourself no harm: for we are all here. Then the jailor called for a light, and sprang in, and came trembling, he fell down before Paul and Silas, and brought them out, and said, Sirs, what must I do to be saved?"
What ever possessed the man to ask about being saved anyway? Why did it ever occur to him that he was unsaved? Well, according to verse 18, Paul and Silas had been preaching and teaching Jesus Christ in the city for "many days." Their ministry had caused the uproar that resulted in their imprisonment. And surely the jailor, into whose special keeping these men had been committed, must have known something about what they were saying and what they were preaching. And the gospel of Jesus Christ always confronts a person with his sins. It just does, friend. I have people say to me, "You shouldn't talk about sin. People don't want to hear that, they don’t want to hear that their behavior is sinful. And they won't listen to you if you talk about sin." But, friend, any message that does not confront a person with his sin is not the gospel of Jesus Christ! It can't be, because the very heart and substance of the gospel of Christ, is His death for our sin, His burial in the grave, and His resurrection (1 Corinthians 15 and 1 to 3). Well, there's much more to it, of course; that would be the story of the incarnation, His sinless life, His church, His ascension to heaven, his coming again, and other things, but any message that does not declare His death for our sins, just isn't the good news of the gospel of Christ.
And the jailor must have heard enough of their preaching, or enough talk around town about their preaching, to have been aware of the error of his way. He hadn't heard enough to know how to be saved, but he had heard enough to know that he was unsaved! And so, he called for a light; he ran in; he fell down before Paul and Silas; he brought them out of the prison...and made the urgent appeal, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?"
Now, Paul was an apostle of Jesus Christ. He was inspired of God, so if we can determine from this passage what Paul told this man to do, and what he did--well, we will have a sufficient answer for our viewer, won’t we? Now this person who asked for such information-- and for ourselves and for you, maybe, wouldn't you say we would have an answer? So now, what happened? Well, the next verse (verse 31) says "And they (that would be Paul and Silas) said in response to the jailor’s question, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved, and your household."
Now, verse 32 makes sense: "Then they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all that were in his house." You see "faith comes by hearing the word of God" (Romans 10:17). And under these very adverse circumstances, Paul and Silas taught this man and his family what the Bible now says about Jesus Christ. What all they said, we don't know, because the passage doesn't tell us. Certainly they would have told him about our Lord's crucifixion, His burial in Joseph's tomb, and His glorious resurrection three days later. Oh, they surely told him, "Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is no other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved" (Acts 4 and 12).
They had to have said something about baptism, because the next verse (verse 33) says, "He took them the same hour of the night, and washed their stripes. And immediately (the old King James Version says "the same hour of the night") he and his family, all of them, were baptized." What is the significance of his taking Paul and Silas and washing their stripes? What stripes? Well, you remember don’t you-- awhile ago we talked about it; we learned that the day before his earthquake, Paul and Silas had caused such a stir with their ministry that they were arrested, they were beaten with many stripes and they were thrown in jail? Well, this jailor had shown no mercy on these men up to this time. He had made their feet fast in the stocks; he had kept them in the "inner prison" where it was damp and cold and miserable and uncomfortable. But the jailor didn’t care for any of those things. By midnight the blood of those stripes would have dried and formed crusts. And fever would have risen in their muscles, and their bruised and lacerated backs would have been swollen.
But look at the change of heart in this jailor. He’s concerned now. He believes what they have said about Jesus Christ, and washed and dried those dried blood stains and clumps of blood out of those fevered stripes. Don't you know that cool water felt good to Paul and Silas? Oh, what a relief! In the language of the Bible, this jailor had repented and was bringing forth meet for repentance. He had a change of heart. It was manifested in a change of behavior toward his prisoners. And he and all of his family were baptized immediately.
When I was a child going to church with my mother, and we heard the preacher in her church preach about this jailor many times, and he would get to verse 31 which says, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved." And he would end his sermon there, and appeal to the people. "Only believe, only believe, just believe in the Lord,” he would say, “and be saved, just believe." And more often than not, we would sing the song, "Only trust Him, Only trust Him, He will save you now." But, my friend, you can see what I saw then: the story doesn't end in verse 31; it continues on to verses 33 and 34, which tell us he repented. And he was baptized, he and all of his family. And he "rejoiced, believing in God with all of his household."
Well, forasmuch as He has appointed a day in which He will judge the world, "God commands all men everywhere to repent." "The Lord is...longsuffering to us-ward, He is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance" (2 Peter 3:9). And any plan of salvation that does not include repentance is a false one, friend. It is impotent; it cannot save! Acts 2, describing the events of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit led the apostle Peter to say to those people who had asked information about how to be saved, he said, "Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit." That is verse 38.
So, this man was told to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. He did! And he repented! He was also baptized-- immediately, the same hour of the night, past midnight. That is important because of the very nature and the purpose of baptism. Let us pray. Thank You, our Father, for this good message in Your word, the example that You have given us how to be saved. In response to one’s question, “What must I do to be saved?” we have the answer and an example. In the lovely name of Jesus, we thank You, we praise You, and we pray to You. Amen!
My friend, God knowing my heart, the purpose of this message has been to give you the information you asked for and the information you need about how to be saved. It has not been my purpose to find an easy or convenient way for you. Nor has it been my purpose to make the way more difficult by requiring you to conform to any church tradition or catechism or creed. I've tried to tell you as simply as I can in the time that I have in one message-- verse by verse right straight from the Scriptures themselves-- what God's word says in response to the very human question, "What must I do to be saved?"
There are other ways of salvation being offered nowadays. I call them "bargain-basement" plans. I don't mean to be unkind or ugly saying that. Over the years men have taught salvation by works; others by grace; and others by faith only. But, the inspired apostle didn’t tell the jailor any of that. In a matter as serious as this one is you don't want some sort of a convenient, marked-down, cheap, discounted kind of a deal, do you? I know you don’t. You want Scripture based on information that is in the Bible and that's what we have given you today. It’s clear from the inspired example that we have studied today, that a convicted sinner must believe in Jesus Christ as the Son of the living God; He must repent or turn away from his sinful lifestyle, whatever that sin is; and he must be baptized, not as a church tradition, or ordinance, but for the remission of his sins.
If you would like someone to come by your house and study these things in more detail, we would love to send somebody by-- but we are not going to do it without your invitation first. We are not here to exploit you. We don't want to take advantage of you in any way and we don't want you ever to think that we have exploited you or taken advantage of you. But oh, how we would love to study the subject of salvation in Jesus Christ with you in your home. Call or write us and give us that information, will you?
If you don't want to do that, but you would like to study the matter more, and you want to enroll in our free Bible correspondence course, why not enroll today? Printed copies are available to you of this program, audio cassette tape and on CDs. And you may have them free of course. Our address is In Search of the Lord's Way, P.O. Box 371, Edmond, OK 73083. Our e-mail address is searchtv@searchtv.org. Our toll-free number is 1-800-321-8633. So you may call us if you like. Let us hear from you this week, will you? We plan to be back next Sunday. Hope you will too. God bless. We love you.
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