The Solid Truth Concerning Salvation

At the end of the book of Acts, the apostle Paul is under house arrest in Rome awaiting a hearing from Caesar at his request. He is to appear before Nero and give an account of his work, teaching, and testimony concerning the Lord Jesus Christ and the salvation from sin He provides to all people. He had spent the better part of three decades travelling throughout most of the vast Roman Empire telling everyone he met about the Lord Jesus. At one time a violent opponent of the fledgling church, which he had seen as a threat to God and the Jewish faith had been stopped and dramatically converted on the road to Damascus by the risen, glorified Lord Jesus Christ. He had chosen this murderous fanatic to be His messenger and spread the Gospel to those lands beyond Judea (Acts 1:1-11).

Paul had dealt with numerous hardships. He had written about them in letters to the churches he had founded, helped to strengthen and often rebuke for the sake of the Gospel and to see people freed from the penalties of sin and eternal death through the mercy and grace of Jesus Christ. Over the years he had debated with the Pharisees, cast out demons, healed the sick, silenced sorcerers, argued before the philosophers of Athens, and had survived being nearly stoned to death by a mob outside the city of Lystra. He wrote letters about the need to teach sound doctrine, how to live as a follower of Christ, and issue correction to the churches while he often languished in a prison cell not knowing if he would live to see another day. He spent time with young pastors, encouraging and mentoring them concerning the teaching of Scripture, the rise of false teachers, personal and church conduct, and discipline.

Paul spent time with his fellow Jews, showing in the Scriptures that Jesus Christ was the promised Messiah and fulfilled the prophecies, just as the risen Lord had taught to the two men traveling on the road to Emmaus (Luke 24:13-27). The Gospel message Peter preached on the Day of Pentecost (Acts 2:14-39) resulted in 3,000 Jews repenting of their sins and coming to Christ for salvation. The Gospel remained within Jewish circles until the conversion of the Roman centurion Cornelius, mentioned in Acts 10. The message of salvation was available to the Gentiles also, and it would be Paul, Barnabas, Silas, and others who would commit themselves to spreading the Word to them. Towards the end of Paul's ministry, the opposition to the Gospel from the Jews was escalating, becoming more hostile and argumentative.

Because of this hostility from the Jewish leaders and others, Paul told them that he would take the Gospel to the Gentiles from that time on. When you read his letters, they were all addressed to Gentile cities and individuals (Rome, Corinth. Ephesus, Colossae, Thessalonica, Galatia, Philippi, Philemon, and Timothy). The Gentiles tended to be more open to the Word of God as they saw that their pagan deities really offered nothing. The generations of Christian elders and pastors who followed the lead of the apostles saw the expansion of Jesus' message spread throughout the Empire and lands that included what are today the nations of Russia, India, Persia, the Balkans, Asia, and later, the Americas.

The message of salvation in Jesus Christ (John 14:6; Acts 4:12) has traveled around the world, more so in these final days due to the work of those men and women who were and are dedicated to Him. They brought the Bible and their testimony to places and people who were in spiritual darkness or imprisoned by ungodly authorities who had vowed to prevent the Gospel from entering their countries. Over the centuries, the message has often been blurred and sometimes mishandled by clerics, clerks, and crusaders, but has always been able to return to the original message of the need to repent and surrender their lives to Christ. Salvation is of the LORD and not your words or works (Ephesians 2:8-9). Before we can understand what salvation means in terms of peace with God, we need to know why we even need to be saved in the first place. The question is, "Saved from what?" The Gospel message makes no sense if we fail to answer that question and what it means in terms of the consequences for anyone who either receives the message or rejects it, throwing away their only chance of escaping the wrath of God that is to come upon this world as punishment for our sin, rebellion, and hatred against Him.

We come to Jesus for salvation because we are sinners, wicked and reprehensible. Sin has numerous characteristics such as filthy talk (Proverbs 10:19), contempt for others (Proverbs 14:21), foolish thinking (Proverbs 24:9), unbelief (Romans 14:23), lawbreaking (1John 3:4), and all manner of unrighteous behavior and speech (1 John 5:17). The Bible says that sin originated in the heart of the archangel Lucifer (Isaiah 14:12-17; Ezekiel 28:11-17). He and a third of the angels rebelled against God's rule in heaven. Lucifer believed that he should receive praise and honor and rule instead of God. He and the rebellious angels were thrown out of heaven and cast to the earth. Lucifer, now known as Satan (a word meaning "the adversary") used his evil reasoning to have Adam and Eve doubt God and rebel against Him, believing the lie that the evil one had planted within their mind and heart (Genesis 3:5; Psalm 51:5; Romans 5:19).