BEFORE we begin, if you are a believer in Jesus Christ, take a moment to name your sins to God the Father. This will allow you to be filled with the power of The Holy Spirit as you read this booklet (EPH 5:18 & 1JO 1:9). IF YOU HAVE never believed in Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, you have that opportunity right now. Simply tell God the Father that you are believing on His Son Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior. If you make that decision, you are now a believer and will always be a child of God! When you die, you will spend eternity with Him forever in heaven! (JOH 3:16 & ACT 16:31).
There is no time when faith is more tested than when someone who is not saved, has faith and believes in Jesus Christ as his or her personal savior! Think of it! You’re going from no belief to believing with nothing but your faith to get you there! There is a great fight going on inside the person who does not believe – a struggle between the old self and the new self! If a person can free himself of the dark picture which describes the situation of the lost, he has, by that process, accepted God as his authority and believed those Scriptures which describe the situation of the saved.
We are naturally prone to disregard the simple boundary lines of distinction between the saved and the unsaved as indicated in the Bible. We are naturally occupied with the things that are seen and are by nature blind to the eternal things: But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised. (1COR 2:14)
Look at JOH 3:3: Jesus answered and said to him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.” We are inclined to see salvation as resulting from how we live our lives – morally and religiously – rather than a state created by the Power of God. This is that idea of doing things to please God which is impossible outside of His Plan and without being saved. Most people see living a “good” life and going to a church as “practical” and “reasonable,” and they see little value in the Biblical appeal for personal faith in the Saving Power and Grace of God. A saved person, by his new life from God, may live a good and moral life; but to attempt to live a good and moral life will not, and cannot, save a lost soul. The unsaved, according to the Bible, include all who have not been accepted by God through a personal trust in the Crucified and Risen Savior. All moral and religious people are not, therefore, to be counted among the saved.
Paul prayed for Israel that they might be saved according to ROM 10:1-2: Brethren, my heart’s desire and my prayer to God for them [Israel] is for their salvation. For I testify about them that they have a zeal for God, but not in accordance with knowledge. The people for whom he prayed were the very ones about whom he wrote that they had “a zeal for God” and went about trying to establish their own righteousness. We know, also, that they fasted, and prayed, and gave a tithe of all they possessed; yet, in spite of all this, they inspired the Apostle Paul prayers to be saved. To be saved was, in Paul’s mind, more than the diligent effort to be moral and religious. And, of course, he was correct!
The Bible sharply distinguishes between the saved and the unsaved. It bases its distinctions on the eternal necessities and provisions within the larger sphere of the kingdom of God. Here the important issues of conduct and service are not first to be considered. The new nature is the primary objective and no good works can take its place. And the new nature is a result of Salvation.
Being a member of a church or even the preaching profession cannot take the place of the Biblical requirement for salvation. Nor will it remove the final doom that is assured to those who reject the Savior. Let’s look at the Parable of the Ten Virgins: “Then the kingdom of heaven will be comparable to ten virgins, who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom. Five of them were foolish, and five were prudent. For when the foolish took their lamps, they took no oil with them, but the prudent took oil in flasks along with their lamps. Now while the bridegroom was delaying, they all got drowsy and began to sleep. But at midnight there was a shout, ‘Behold, the bridegroom! Come out to meet him.’ Then all those virgins rose and trimmed their lamps. The foolish said to the prudent, ‘Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.’ But the prudent answered, ‘No, there will not be enough for us and you too; go instead to the dealers and buy some for yourselves.’ And while they were going away to make the purchase, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the wedding feast; and the door was shut. Later the other virgins also came, saying, ‘Lord, lord, open up for us.’ But he answered, ‘Truly I say to you, I do not know you.’ Be on the alert then, for you do not know the day nor the hour. (MAT 25:1-13) The five virgins possessed every outward appearance but were without the oil which is the symbol of the Divine life. In spite their religious appearance, they heard Our Lord say: “I know you not.” This should stand as a warning to you that you need to be prepared for the Divine life. Preparation is the daily intake of Bible doctrine with the correct Pastor-Teacher!
Jesus describes the situation for the unsaved in LUK 19:10: “For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.” So, you can see that God has made arrangements for those who are lost and unsaved. The most famous scripture on this subject, also a quote of Jesus Christ’s, is found in JOH 3:16: “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.”
In EPH 2:1-2, we find a plain and simple description of the unsaved: And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. The death described in this verse is not physical, for the dead ones are said to be “walking according to the course of this world.” They are also said to be “walking according to the prince of the power of the air (Satan).”
The “children of disobedience,” includes all of those who have NOT been “made alive” by the power of God through belief in His Son. In this verse, Satan is said to be the energizing power for all the children of disobedience, regardless of professions or conduct. Satan’s energy may inspire refinement, education, culture, and the externals of religion, because he isn’t against these external virtues. He is directly against the Saving Grace of God, which is a widely differing issue from that which the problems of personal conduct present.
In EPH 2:2, Satan is said to be energizing the unsaved. In the same way, the saved are said to be energized by God: …for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure. (PHI 2:13). These two passages teach us that there is no such thing as an independent human life. People are either energized by God or by Satan, depending on whether they are saved or unsaved.
The situation of the unsaved is revealed again in COL 1:13: For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves…Until this divine transformation takes place, man is considered to be under the powers of darkness.
{to be continued}