Can God Really Save Your Soul? Series

Can God Really Save Your Soul?

John 3:16-17

Intro

In this passage detailing the conversation between the Lord Jesus Christ and Nicodemus, the Lord says, very plainly, that He came into the world to provide salvation for all men. The matter of salvation is of vital importance to every person under the sound of my voice, and throughout the entire world, for that matter. You see, what you do about salvation will determine where you spend your eternity.

Before we move deeper into this message, I want to offer up a definition. Too often, we Christians forget that we are like a little subculture. What I mean is that we have our own dialect and sometimes the things we say are simply confusing to those who don’t know our lingo. One word that I want to define today is the word Jesus used in verse 17. Jesus tells us that He did not come into the world to condemn the world, but that the world, through Him, might be “saved.” It is that word “saved” that I want to consider for a moment.

We throw that word around in our sermons and in our testimonies, but those who are not saved may not understand what we mean when we use the word saved. So, to clear up any confusion, I want to tell you what that word means. The word “saved” comes from the Greek word “sozw”, (pronounced – sode zo). This word literally means, “to save, to keep safe and sound, to rescue from danger or destruction.

• To save one (from injury or peril)

o To save a suffering one (from perishing), that is, one suffering from disease, to make well heal, restore to health.

o To preserve one who is in danger of destruction, to save or rescue.

• To save in the technical, Biblical sense

o To deliver from the penalties of the Messianic judgment

o To save from the evils which obstruct the reception of the Messianic deliverance

If this word has that meaning, then why do we use it in regard to the soul? Because, man is his natural state, is a sinner, Roman. 3:23. When we come into this world, we arrive here already under a death sentence, Rom. 6:23. Unless a person is “saved” then they will die in their sins and they will spend eternity in Hell, forever separated from the presence and power of God. Now, no right thinking person wants that to happen to them! Therefore, we must know how we can be saved. That is something I will explain as this message unfolds.

Now, we know what it means to be saved, and I think we all want that for ourselves, we are about to find out how to be saved. All that remains in this one question, “Can God Really Save Your Soul?” that is, if you do what the Bible says and receive His plan of salvation, can God really save you and keep you out of Hell? That is the question I would like to answer this morning. Can God Really Save Your Soul? I say, “Yes He Can!” Allow me to give you three reasons why.

I. God’s Promise to Save

a. It is an Old Promise

i. In the beginning, when God made man in His image and man decided to sin against the Lord, God made a promise to Eve in the Garden of Eden, Gen. 3:15.

ii. God’s promise to provide a means of salvation is even older than that.

iii. Rev. 13:8 tells us that Jesus is “the lamb slain form the foundation of the world.”

iv. Peter takes it even farther in 1 Peter 1:20, “who verily was foreordained before the foundation of the world.”

v. These verses tell us that even before there wsa a sinner to save, before there was even a sin to cleanse, the Lord already formulated a plan to redeem sinners.

vi. His is a plan older than man, older than sin, older than Satan.

vii. God’s promise to save is an old promise that shall never fail.

b. It is an Ongoing Promise

i. While God’s promise is older than the world and even older than mankind, it still has all the power of the Almighty behind it.

ii. The promise is as valid today as it has ever been.

iii. John 5:24, John 3:16, Acts 16:31.

1. This promise has never and will never lose its great power.

2. God is a saving god and nothing will ever change that truth.

c. It is an Open Promise

i. God’s promise of salvation is not limited to a selected few, but it is a promise that is offered to all men.

ii. There are several passges that bear out this truth.

1. Rev. 22:17; John 6:27; Rom. 6:47, just to name a few.