Well, may it please God to be
with us as we meditate in His holy word this afternoon. Let's turn to the chapter we
read, that's the Acts of the Apostles, chapter 16, and we'll
read verses 30 and 31. The Acts of the Apostles, chapter
16, and reading verses 30 and 31. and brought them out and said,
sirs, what must I do to be saved? And they said, believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved and thy house. This is really a very interesting
account that we read together, and it's straightforward and
very direct. And we see, as we began, that
God called Paul and Silas to go into this place, which was
quite a long way from where they were, into Macedonia, and to
come into this place of Philippi. And it was God's amazing determination
that they should come to Philippi and the Lord should bless people.
And of course, although that came to pass, there were still
difficulties. There were hardships. And sometimes
we might think in our life that a Christian life is always going
to be an easy path. But of course, we're promised
in the word of God that it never will be. So we should not be
surprised. But it was quite wonderful that
God should have called Paul and Silas to go into Macedonia, into
Philippi. And as we read, first of all,
they came and sat by the riverside and preached to the women that
gathered there. And Lydia, a woman, was blessed. In a very simple way, we're told
the Lord opened her heart. There wasn't any dramatic conversion,
we might think, but nonetheless it was a very true and a very
real conversion because she did believe and the result was she
believed and was indeed baptized. And it's good that God has given
us such a simple example for us to come and consider. There
we have this woman that she believed in her heart and those things
which Paul had preached to them. Well, then they came and they
had a difficulty. They were preaching the gospel.
And the effect of that was to cause a woman to come and disagree
with what they were saying. And in actual fact, it had a
big effect upon the neighborhoods. So they weren't able to enjoy
all the benefits that they'd had. and therefore they complained
and they came to their masters and they saw the hope of their
gains were gone they caught Paul and Silas and drew them into
the marketplace under the rulers and brought them to the magistrates
saying these men being Jews do exceedingly trouble our city
and teach customs which are not lawful for us to receive, neither
to observe, being Romans. And the multitude rose up together
against them, and the magistrates rent off their clothes and commanded
to beat them. Well, Paul and Silas, what have
they done? They preached the gospel, nothing
more, nothing less. But it had such an effect of
hatred which came into the hearts of these people that eventually
the magistrates commanded that they should be beaten and they
were beaten and cast into prison. Well, we have this as a sanitary
reminder when we see difficulties being carried out throughout
the world today. We should not really be surprised
because there is great enmity to the gospel. There always has
been and there always will be and therefore we should not be
surprised. And yet, you see, there was still wonderful blessing
which was to take place. And these poor nocilis were cast
into prison and the jailer was told to keep them fast and not
let them escape. And then we read an amazing example
of God's grace. And of course, grace is the free
unmerited favor of God and that's what Paul and Silas had and they
were there in the prison and in the stocks and at midnight
they sang praises unto God. Well try and imagine that situation.
They'd been beaten, They got sore backs with all the lashes.
They were in stocks. They couldn't lie down comfortably.
And yet, they sang praises to God. And the effect was, and
the prisoners heard them. It wasn't something they whispered. It wasn't something kept quiet.
They sang it out loud so the prisoners heard them. And it
should be a good example to us today We may not be in prison,
we may not be in the stocks, but nonetheless, we should recognize
that the Word of God tells us that we are God's witnesses. And it would be good, therefore,
if we were to sing praises, perhaps, as we go about, you know, when
you're at school or university or college or work, to sing praises. Perhaps we think, oh, I couldn't
do that. Well, these men did it. And the
result was, it was a wonderful blessing to the people. So we
should never be ashamed and we should never be discouraged to
show forth whose we are and whom we serve. Sometimes we might
think, well, the cost of doing that is just too big. All my
friends will laugh at me. They'll all hate me. They may
not. We make sometimes wrong assumptions
come to a wrong conclusion. Well, then we read, suddenly
there was a great earthquake, so the foundation of the prisons
were shaken, and immediately all the doors were opened, and
everyone's bands were loosed. You see, God is able to appear,
and he did on this occasion, in this wonderful way. There
was suddenly this great earthquake, and there was this freedom for
the prisoners. Well, the keeper of the prison,
awaking out of his sleep and seeing the prison doors open,
dragged his sword and would have killed himself, supposing that
the prisoners had fled. But Paul cried with a loud voice,
saying, do thyself no harm, for we are all here, and called for
a light, sprang in trembling, and fell down before Paul and
Silas. and brought them out and said,
this is what they said. and brought them out and said,
Sirs, what must I do to be saved? Now it's just interesting, the
Word of God can be very precise, and we might think, well, surely
they just called out together, or one of them called out, but
no, it said, they called out, what must I do to be saved? So
obviously, they called out in the singular, and whoever it
was, not only the Jada, but probably others, called out, what must
I do to be saved? It was a personal request. And
that is the reality of religion. It is a personal request. You and I are individuals. You
and I need to come precisely to such a position as this and
to come before God in this very way and cry out, what must I
do to be saved? And you might say, well, I'm
not quite sure, what do you mean to be saved from what? To be
saved from being in prison? They could get out of prison?
Or perhaps be slain because they let the prison doors open? No,
it was far more serious than that. Obviously, Paul and Silas
had preached the gospel to them. and as they had preached the
gospel to them they would have pointed out to them very clearly
that they were individuals they had a never-dying soul and they
must spend eternity either in heaven or in hell and surely
the cry was that they wanted to be saved from ending up in
hell when every one of us here this afternoon needs exactly
the same, has the same requirement. That all of us may be saved from
ending up in hell. The Bible is very clear. We have
not time to go through all the references but there's many references
that speak to us about hell. That it is never-ending. People
seem to often pass over these things and very glibly They speak
about hell, but the Bible doesn't speak glibly about it. And it
tells us that if we are not saved from going into hell, we shall
spend eternity in hell. And that is a very terrible consideration. And you may say, well, that's
very morbid. Well, it may be morbid on that
side, but there's the other side. If we are saved, We shall then
go to heaven in bliss and happiness eternally, where there will be
no change. So the Bible sets before us those
two situations, either heaven or hell. And all of us here this
afternoon, young or old, all of us will spend eternity either
in heaven or in hell. And there's no way out, and there's
no escape, and there's no gray area in the Word of God. The
Word of God is very clear. And all of us, I hope, desire
to go to heaven. And some people believe in annihilation. That means when they come to
die, it's finished and there's nothing else to occur. Well,
that's totally untrue. The truth is that all of us possess
a never dying soul. We have a natural body and we
have a soul. The natural body dies. The soul
never dies. You and I are born with a natural
body and a soul. And that soul lives forever.
And at the great day of the resurrection, our bodies will be reunited to
that soul. And then we shall be again, either
forever with the Lord in glory, or forever with the devil and
all his angels, forever, all the enemies of God. And the Bible
gives us a little view, and it's really too terrible sometimes
to just think about, but we should just realize that it gives the
view that hell is eternal darkness. There's no time to rest. There's no light. There's nothing
to enjoy. And we're told it'll be a place
of gnashing of teeth crying and sighing and there's no escape
from it well perhaps this jailer here had been told about it and
he realized the relevance and the importance of it and therefore
we can understand what he says he says this great desire what
must I do to be saved well it's a great blessing if every one
of us comes and says that very word, that very phrase rather,
what must I do to be saved? Now no doubt some of you are
able to say well by God's grace I am saved and we can praise
God for that but perhaps you can't all say that and if you
can't What a blessing if such a word,
such a cry really as this rivets itself in your conscience and
you can't get rid of it until the Lord does show you that you
are saved. Well the question was, what must
I do to be saved? So what did Paul and Silas say? What was the answer to that?
Well it was a very simple answer. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ
and thou shalt be saved. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ
and thou shalt be saved. Well, you see, the great question
is then as to whether you and I do believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ. You know, many people poo-poo
such statements. and are ignorant of them. But
the truth is that all of us need to be saved from hell and if
we're saved from hell it'll mean that we're saved from our sins
because all have sinned, every one of us have sinned and come
short of the glory of God and all of us deserve hell because
we've disobeyed the commands of God. None of us can escape
that truth. We are all guilty. We're all
on the same ground. We all stand and have to put
our hands up and say, I'm guilty. I'm a sinner. I deserve eternal
punishment for my sins. Well, we realize the only way
then to be saved from that eternal punishment is to look and come
to the Lord Jesus Christ. Well, how important that is that
you and I are able to come and to believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ. Now, you and I need to be able
to do that. And we need, therefore, God to
look upon us and bless us with that true desire to come to him. True desire. to confess our sins
and true desire to come just like this Jonah did and ask what
must I do to be saved what must I do to be delivered from another
phrase in the Bible is the wrath to come yes it's a tragic terrible
situation and so many people you see they are not concerned
about it they're not concerned about it well may all of us be
concerned about it and perhaps you'll come to that position
where you tremble before God you tremble the thought of spending
eternity not in heaven but eternity in hell well don't pass away
don't think well it's irrelevant and don't say well I'm not going
to believe what that old boy said this afternoon Because we have the Word of God. And again, you may say to me,
but I don't believe the Word of God. I don't believe it's
important at all. Well let me assure you that God's
Word is true. God's Word is true and it gives
a wonderful record of what has occurred since God himself created
the world. And again we live in a world
today when so many people disbelieve the truth of God. They don't
want to believe in creation. They want to believe in evolution
and the reality is you can't prove evolution They are unprepared
to believe in creation and you know the reason Man women don't
want to believe there is a God If you and I believe there is
a God we must come to their conclusion that God created all things People
don't want to believe it Because they know they're guilty and
they want to do their own thing. And yet if you sit down very
carefully and realize, yes, I couldn't possibly do what's been done.
No one could. There must have been an amazing
plan, an amazing person that created these beings that you
and I are. Yes, it emanates from the true
and ever-living God. No one else. No one else. And the Bible is given to us
to give us a record that what happened all those years ago
in the Garden of Eden and how the world was created to form
the Garden of Eden and then things which have occurred since then.
And also, the wonderful thing about the Bible is It tells us
what's gonna happen. It tells us, or it told us what
was gonna happen, how the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, would
come. You can go back, and again, we haven't got time, but through
the Old Testament, on numerous occasions, there is very accurate
prophecy about the Lord Jesus Christ, how he would be born
of a virgin, where he would be born, in what way he would be
born. all the details, and then his
life, and then how he would die, very clearly set forth hundreds
and thousands of years before it came to pass. And then those
things were fulfilled, a very clear proof that the Bible is
true. And because those things have
been fulfilled, And are true, we can believe that all the Bible
therefore is true. And therefore, as the Bible tells
us, there will be an end of all things. We can believe it is
true. There will be. We're here today.
We may not be tomorrow. The world's here today. It may
not be tomorrow. The Bible tells us very simply,
be also ready for in such an hour as you think not, the Son
of Man cometh. And I'd like to just ask you
all an important question. I've told you the Word of God
is true. I've told you that the end of
all things will come and you and I will die. The great question
is, are we ready? Are you and I ready to die? If
God came tonight and took your life away, would you be ready
to die? It's not a hypothetical question. It's a very true situation. And
we're told, be also ready. And how important, therefore,
that we are ready. We need to be ready at all times. And if we are to be ready, this
truth will be fulfilled in our lives. We will have believed
on the Lord Jesus Christ. And you may say, well, why is
it important that I should believe on the Lord Jesus Christ? Very
clearly, you and I cannot save ourselves. We cannot save ourselves
because we are sinners. And we cannot do that which makes
ourselves just. And you may ask, well, what do
you mean by that? Well, I mean this. No one who is not just
will go to heaven. And you and I can't make ourselves
just. But the glory and blessing of
the gospel is this, that Jesus Christ can and does make unworthy
sinners just because he has died for all his church. And in that
great death that he died, all those years ago, he paid the
price to take away your sin and my sin. The price that was required
to take away our sin was the death of the Lord Jesus Christ. And again, just pause for a moment
and think of the amazing plan of God. The Lord Jesus Christ
is very God himself, the second person in the Trinity. Again,
another scene which is impossible for us to work out in our little
minds. these things are just beyond
us we can't work out eternity it's just too big for us we can't
understand it with our little minds so what are we going to
do well God gives faith faith to believe And what a wonderful
thing that is, that God does give us. He gives us faith to
believe. And the Hebrews gives us, in
the epistles of Paul to the Hebrews, gives us a very succinct, a very
simple definition, and it's this. Faith is the substance of things
hoped for and the evidence of things not seen. You see, it's
not, these things are not tangible. We can't just grasp them. We
can't physically get hold of them. But God gives us faith
to believe these great and wonderful truths. And that is the requirement
that you and I believe that the Lord Jesus Christ came into this
world for the great and wonderful purpose of saving our souls. where God uses a wonderful word,
redeeming. Redeeming means to pay the price
for. You see, our sin has to be taken
away and it has to be taken away. And to be taken away, it has
to be, the price has to be paid to take away our sins. Well,
human currency, pounds and dollars, whatever it is, is not adequate,
it's not sufficient, it's the wrong currency. Do you know what
the currency is? To take away your sin and my
sin. The Bible tells us what it is.
And I'll tell you, the currency to take away your sin and my
sin is the precious blood of Christ. That means the death
of the Lord Jesus Christ. That was the enormous price that
was required to take away your sin and my sin. All God's people
need their sins to be taken away. There is no sin in heaven, not
the smallest sin. It's a perfect place. There's
no sin. All of us then need all our sins
to be taken away. And it can only be removed through
the precious blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. So that's why Jesus
came into this world. He came into this world to save
sinners. And so we have this glorious
statement, which Paul said to the jailer when he asked the
question, what must I do to be saved? The answer was, believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. So that's
a wonderful, wonderful truth. And how important it is, you
and I realize it because all of us need to know that we have
a need. We need to be saved. We need
to have our sins forgiven. And the only way that can be
done is through the Lord Jesus Christ and believing on Him. Well, my friends, what a blessing
it is if God gives you and me faith to believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ. Without it, we shall perish. We shall go to hell. It's vital,
vital that all of us have this wonderful and blessed privilege
that God may show to us and prove to us and give us to know that
we are amongst those. for whom the Blessed Saviour
came into this sinful world to suffer and to bleed and to die
so that you and I might possess the great and wonderful gift
of eternal life. Well, the result as we know was
that the Jada was indeed baptised. Yes, he did and we're thankful
for it and we're thankful that that ordinance has carried on shown to us by John the Baptist
and then of course the Lord Jesus Christ himself who was willing
to set a glorious example and that's the example that we have
the Savior himself and we know it was right you say why do you
know it was right because a voice from heaven came down and said
this is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased So we know
it was right and we today are privileged to follow the Lord
Jesus Christ in believers' baptism. It is that which we are to do,
to take up our cross and to follow Him. It's a great privilege. When you think what the Saviour
did to save our souls, gave his life. He gives us this might
say small position to follow him in that way of believers
baptism. Well we're thankful that Abigail
has been blessed and that real desire to follow her Lord and
Master the Lord Jesus Christ, and to be baptized. And you may
again say, well, what's the significance? Well, we have the significance
of baptism spelled out really very simply for us in the sixth
chapter of the Romans and the third to sixth verses. I'll just
read it to you. It says, know ye not that so
many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into
his death therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death
as we go down into the water and are put under the water that
signifies being buried with him into his death that like as christ
was raised up from the dead by the glory of the father even
so we also should walk in newness of life as we come up out of
the water. It signifies being raised from
the dead, signifies the resurrection. You see the very simple and yet
wonderful picture that we have in this ceremony. And then he
goes on to say, for if we have been planted together in the
likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his
resurrection, knowing this, that our old man is crucified with
him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, and henceforth
we should not serve sin. So this ceremony of baptism is
very significant It has, therefore, a very deep and real meaning,
and it's a wonderful privilege, therefore, to take up our cross
and to follow the wonderful example of our Saviour, the Lord Jesus
Christ. I'm sure of this. You and I,
in our lives, have many things to regret. We never regret being
baptised. And the Word of God tells us
very clearly, those that honour me, I will honour. And those that despise me, I
will lightly esteem. Well, I'm sure we don't want
to be lightly esteemed by Almighty God. So here this afternoon,
really, what a blessing it is if we take on board this great
question, what must I do to be saved? and realise the wonderful
answer, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved,
and to have been blessed or will be blessed with that wonderful
truth, and then to recognise the relevance of baptism and
be pleased to follow the despised and crucified man, the glorious
Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ, on whom our hopes of heaven depend.