3/27/19 Nick (video HERE)
If someone asked you the same question asked of Paul and
Silas by their jailer, “What must I do to be saved?”, how would you
answer?
I occasionally ask this of Christians I meet while reaching
out with Gospel conversations, and I often get a disappointing response –
something on the order of “I just tell them to read the Bible, it’s all right
there”.
Why disappointing?
Shouldn’t we encourage all people to read the Bible for themselves?
For many, to simply say “read the Bible for yourself” can be
used as a cheap substitute for Christians who can’t articulate the Gospel. But as I reviewed a recent conversation I had
with a man named Nick at a Menards store, I realized that I had done the same
thing. My overall point made with Nick
was to lead him to the Bible, rather than to Jesus.
Sometimes I forget how confusing the Bible can be for
unbelievers, and place too much trust in their willingness to read it and their
ability to understand it. I think Paul
was saying the same thing when he wrote in 1 Cor. 2: “The person without the
Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but
considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are
discerned only through the Spirit.”
Instead of using the few minutes of our conversation there
at the store to encourage Nick to “read the Bible for himself”, I wish I had focused
on the main thing – I wish I had put the focus on his need for Jesus.
In the Bible, when the jailer asked Paul and Silas in Acts
16 - “What must I do to be saved?”, the
answer was ““Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved—you and your
household.”
Seems simple enough for the Christian, but what does that mean
to an unbeliever? What does it mean to “believe”? Who exactly is “the Lord Jesus”? What does it mean to be “saved”? How can one’s family be included in this
promise?
After this bold promise, Paul and Silas did something else
for the jailer – “Then they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all the
others in his house.” The jailer
received an explanation, in person, of what this “word of the Lord” meant. Paul and Silas didn’t just say “Read it for
yourself”. They took the time to explain
the Gospel to the jailer. I wish I had
done that for Nick.
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