Now, I'd like for you to take
your Bibles and turn with me to Titus chapter 3. And what I hope to do this morning
is to answer this question to some degree. I may not have all
the answers to all the questions that you've ever had, But I want
to do my best to answer this question, what does it mean to
be saved? I was once in religion up to
my eyeballs. I was in it. And I adopted all their vocabulary. And I used it as if I really
knew what it meant. And one of the words I used frequently
was the word saved. Saved. I got saved. I used to tell when I got saved. But what I never knew or never
even thought about is what that salvation was all about. What's
that mean? What's that mean? Saved. What's that mean? Tell me about
it. Somebody said, well, now I'm
saved. OK. Tell me about it. Tell me
about it. I'm interested. I want to know.
What's that mean? Saved. Well, listen to this. Titus chapter 3, verse 1. Put them. Who's them? That's
those to whom the grace of God has come. That's God's elect. That's believers in the Lord
Jesus Christ. Put them in mind to be subject
to principalities and powers and to obey magistrates, to be
ready to every good work, to speak evil of no man, to be no
brawlers, but gentle showing all meekness unto all men. For we ourselves also were sometimes
foolish and disobedient, deceived, serving divers lusts and pleasures,
living in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another. Well,
you say, I don't hate anybody. You do if you won't speak to
us. You killed a man. When you will
not speak to a man, you killed him. You killed him. You just treat him like he's
not even there. You killed that man. You think
we don't hate? Sure we do. Sure we do. Hateful. Hating one another. after that the kindness and love
of God our Savior toward men appeared." I'm not talking about
His appearance on this earth so much here as it's talking
about His appearance in your heart through the gospel. Not by works of righteousness
which we have done, but according to His mercy, He saved us by
the washing of regeneration. and the renewing of the Holy
Ghost, which He shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior,
that being justified by His grace, we should now be made heirs according
to the hope of eternal life. What does it mean to be saved? Go ye into all the world and
preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized
shall be saved. Saved. Paul said, I preached
the gospel to you, and you received it, and that's where you stand.
And he said, you'll be saved if you keep in memory what I
preached to you. Saved. What's that mean? Saved. Saved. Let me give you five things this
morning. First of all, it means an act.
of sovereign mercy on God's part toward you. That's what it means
to be saved. An act of God's sovereign mercy. What's sovereign mercy? That's
the mercy of a sovereign. We stand before God. And God
is just, and God is righteous, and God is sovereign, and He
can dispense His mercy, or He can withhold it. It's here. There's nothing left for a man
in this world but a hope that the sovereign, eternal God will
be merciful to him. Now that's just it. There's nothing
here. There's nothing in you. There's
nothing in this world. There's nothing in religion.
There's nothing in your good works. There's nothing here but
a hope. that the sovereign God of glory
will show mercy to me. That's it. That's it. That's
what it means to be saved. That's what it means to be saved.
Every man is a transgressor of the law and salvation is not
so much about certain things that you've done. God's going
to hold you accountable for what you've done. I don't mean to
say that, but I'm saying it's not so much that, that we're
transgressors of the law. The law condemns every man and
leaves them without excuse before God. We've all transgressed the
law. All have sinned and come short
of the glory of God. But I'm talking about what you
are. Sin. Sin. That's what we are. Sin
entered and death passed. And it's evidenced by the fact
that all have sinned. But salvation goes a little deeper
than that. Sin has to do with what we are.
We're sinners. And to be a sinner is not a crime. Are you listening? Being a sinner
is not a crime. It's a condition. It's why we
do the crime. We're sinners. We're sinners. It's a state of being. It's the
reality of our being. In Ephesians 2, 3, he says that
those whom God quickened from the dead were by nature the children
of wrath even as others. By nature. You see where we're
at? We're totally depending on Him
because we are by nature children of wrath. A sinner by nature is one who
can only sin. That's all he can do. All he can do. To do anything holy, righteous,
or good is beyond his nature. And so Paul said when he talked
about the Jews who claimed to be holy, who claimed that they
did righteous works, And when he talked to them, he said, we
have before proved both Jews and Gentiles, they're all under
sin. Therefore, he said, there's none righteous. You can't do
a righteous thing. Can't do a righteous thing. Can't
do a good thing. Can't do anything. All you can
do is sin, because you're a sinner. Man fell in Adam and the condemnation
of God came with it. And man is in bondage to his
nature. Well, what's that mean? That
means that he's 100% shut up to the sovereign mercy of God.
That's what that means. He can't do anything for himself.
He can't do anything for you. All he can do, like Lazarus,
is lay in the tomb and stink. That's all he can do. He's like a story already told,
the Bible says. Let me read you something out
of the book of Luke. I mean out of the book of Jude.
Jude verse 6. He's talking here about these
false prophets who came in unawares into the church, and then he
begins to describe of some of these men and what their condemnation
is, what their nature is, where they are at, what their condition
is. And listen to what he says here in verse 6. And the angels
which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation,
he hath reserved in everlasting change under darkness unto the
judgment of that great day. Now, I'm going to tell you something.
It's the same story with every man and every woman born of Adam. It's the same story. You're bound
in chains of everlasting darkness reserved unto that day of judgment. And I could read that to you
in II Peter there where he talks about God's long-suffering To
us we're not willing that any should perish, but that all should
come unto repentance. But He said that this world was
reserved. He's keeping it reserved. And
in that day, He's going to fold it up. And judgment's going to
come. And He talks about those men
and women of perdition. These same chains of darkness
bind every fallen son of Adam. He can't break free. Our Lord
said to those, He said, if the light that be in you be darkness,
how great is that darkness? Well, it's dark enough to bind
you unto that day. That's how much there is. And
I know men can't see the chains. I know this world denies their
existence. But I'm telling you on the authority
of the Word of God that this is the very nature of every fallen
son of Adam. He is foolish. He is disobedient. He is deceived. He is serving
divers lusts and pleasures. He is living in malice and envy
and hateful and hating one another. He cannot and will not receive
the things of the Spirit of God. They are foolishness to Him.
In the preaching of the cross, it says to them who are perishing,
who is that? That is those bound in those
chains of darkness. It is foolishness. He cannot and will not believe. He cannot and will not repent. He cannot and will not submit
himself to God or man. The strong man rules in his heart
and his goods are all at peace until a stronger than he overcomes
him and then spoils his goods. That's what has to happen. I'm
telling you, we're shut up. to the sovereign mercy of God.
That's what it means to be saved. To have any inkling of light,
to have any inkling of grace, is due to the sovereign mercy
of God. It's God intervening on your
behalf, giving you light that a lot of men and women in this
world don't have. Many women come in here all the
time, visiting, one time and gone, one time and gone. I can't
even begin to describe to you the mercy of God that's allowed
them to come in here and hear these things. And what do they
do with it? Cast it aside and go their way,
indifferent, totally indifferent to that life. That's where natural
man's at. He's bound by his nature. There's no overcoming it. It's altogether an act of sovereign
mercy for God to call one of His elect. What does it mean
to be saved? It means an appearance of Jesus
Christ in us. There's the second thing. The
appearance of Jesus Christ in us by divine work of grace. All
of the glory of God and His appropriations in eternity. His appearance in
this world. His representative offices and
His substitutionary sacrifice. All of these things. They're
all revealed. in the believer. He understands
these things. These are not things this world
bandage about. These are not things they sit
around and discuss. I hung out with the world most
of my life. I've never heard any of them
even talk about these things. Have you? You can't hardly get
them to listen to them for five minutes in a conversation, let
alone go somewhere and talk about it. How God can be just and justify
of all those who believe. But this saving faith primarily
is at the beginning. There has to be a beginning to
this thing. There has to be a time when a man is born. There has
to be a time when God raises him from the dead and gives him
life. And that wisdom that comes in
that life, that revelation that comes in that life, is how God
has sent forth His Son. by His sovereign grace and in
His sovereign mercy, set forth His Son in His representative
offices, made Him the propitiation for our sins, justified us freely
by His grace through the redemption that was accomplished in Him.
That is where He brings the sinner. That is where the hope is. Men
talk about being saved and talk about having a hope. There is
no hope apart from that. It's just a hope, a hope, a hope.
You might have that kind. But you've got no foundation
for that hope until you see Him as your substitute. Until you
see Him as your representative living under the law, fulfilling
that which God demands from the sinner which he cannot produce. Accomplished by Him. It's an
accomplished salvation. It's done. It's done. I was talking to Winston before
the service, and I said, this whole thing is a manifestation
of God's glory. That's what salvation's all about.
God's going to glorify Himself. He's going to manifest the glory
of His character, His name, through the salvation of a people that
He chose, through the redemption of Christ. Now that's what's
going on. So if I talk about a salvation
that don't save, where's the glory in that? If I talk about
a redemption that does not redeem, where is the glory of God in
that? If I talk about the power of
God in you, the Holy Ghost living in you, abiding in you, and no
change of direction, where is the glory in that? God is not
in that. Everything God does manifests
His glory. Manifests His glory. The glory
of His justice. righteousness, the glory of His
power, the glory of His love. And the very foundation and basis
of His coming was to manifest the glory of God in the salvation
of His elect. And to manifest this glory, He
must, in our stead, be subject to the law of God and obey it
as God requires it to be obeyed. And having done that, Christ,
Paul said, is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone
that believes. To believe on Him is to rest
in His righteousness alone. And according to Romans 3.24,
we are justified freely by His grace through that redemption.
God's elect have all paid their redemption in full by the bloody
death of their substitute. And in the death of Christ, the
glory of God's justice is manifested. He excused no sinner from his
sins. He didn't say, okay, go your
way, but don't do that anymore. That's not what he did. He paid. He paid for that sin, and he
paid it in full. He satisfied his justice through
the death of the substitute. And in the provision of these
things, in the manifestation of these things, the kindness
and love of God our Savior toward men appears. That's how it appears. It appears in the heart in regeneration. He takes the preaching of the
gospel, and He brings to light the glory of God. Read II Corinthians
chapter 4. He'll tell you what salvation
is. He'll tell you what it is. lest the light of the glorious
gospel of Christ should shine unto them." That's what it is. It's to see the light of the
glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. That's that revelation. And he tells us, listen to this,
Titus chapter 3 verse 5, that's what this is telling us. Not
by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to
His mercy. He saved us by the washing of
regeneration. He saved us. Saved us from what?
From the deceit and ignorance and darkness of this world. Saved
us by the washing of regeneration and the renewing of the Holy
Ghost. Well, what's this washing and
renewing all about? It's the washing of a new nature.
A new nature. With regeneration comes revelation. The revelation of truth. And
it washes away the lies and deceits of this world, washes away the
vain ideas and concepts, our old concepts of godliness and
holiness. I used to think holiness was
coming to church. Holiness was not cursing. If
I could just get through a week without cursing, that's holiness. If I could pay my tithes, if
I could just do something, if I could visit the sick, if I
could do anything, that's holiness. That's not holiness. That's not
holiness. It washes away all our vain ideas
and concepts of godliness and holiness, washing away our vain
imaginations concerning the true and living God. It washes those
things. Do you reckon anybody now could
convince you that salvation is by works? Now come on, the majority of
this world believes it. Look at the odds, look at the
multitudes, look at the churches, look at the people, look at the
colleges. Surely we must have made a mistake. No way anybody can convince you
otherwise. You know why? Because of the
washing of regeneration. That's why. and the renewing of the Holy
Ghost. He's washed away that ignorance and darkness. He's
washed it away. And then he talks about a renewing,
renewing a right spirit and attitude. I tell you, when you're the sinner,
when you're the sinner, when you're down here at the bottom,
you're not up here looking down, you're not somewhere in the middle,
well, I'm just like everybody else. No, you're on the bottom.
And you're under the judgment of God. And there's no way out. No way out. And you're down there
in the cell. And you can hear the crowd can't
hardly wait to get you out there and watch you drop with the noose
around your neck. When you're down there, and God
comes to you in sovereign mercy, and takes the key, and turns
the key, and says you're free to go. I guarantee you your attitude
and conduct won't be like it used to be. I won't have to stand
up here every week and say, now, you ladies, you're going to have
to wear your dresses down to here. It's getting a little too
high up here. And you men, you got to get that
hair, get it up above your ears a little bit, and you get them
sideburns trimmed. I'm not going to have to tell
you anything. I'm not going to have to stand up here and hammer
Hammer, hammer on this and hammer on that and hammer on that. When
you find out something about the love and grace and sovereign
mercy of God to a sinner, your life is going to change. You
are going to turn. You are going to see what you
were and you are going to turn from it. You are going to see
what this world is all about. You are going to turn from it.
You are going to see the judgment of God. It is pending. It is just waiting to drop. You're going to turn from it.
You're going to turn from it. And nobody's going to have to
tell you, it's time to get out. Oh no, you're going to know what
time it is. You're going to turn. You're going to turn. Renewing a right spirit and attitude. Renewing a right understanding
of spiritual things. Renewing the affections and motives. He tells us if any man be in
Christ, Joined to Him by a living union of faith. He's a new creature. He's a new creature. Old things
are passed away and behold, all things are become new. It's not
laws and rules and regulations that bring the believer into
submission, but a new creation. A new man. Turn back one chapter
there in Titus and let me show you something. Titus 2, verse
11. For the grace of God that bringeth
salvation. That's what it is. That's what
it is. When the Holy Spirit of God conquers
a man and brings to him, He brings a salvation to him. We talk about
salvation. We see it in the Word of God
where it is. We talk about it. We know where
it is. But when God brings it, it has to be brought to you.
You can't get to it. He has to bring it to you. And
when that grace of God that brings us salvation appears to all His
chosen, it's going to teach them something. What's it going to
teach them? Denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we ought to
live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world.
That's what it teaches. That's what it teaches. Verse
14, Who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from
all iniquity, and purify unto Himself a peculiar people, zealous
of good works. What does it mean to be saved?
It means an act of God's sovereign mercy on a helpless sinner who
otherwise is as sure for hell as those fallen angels. It means
a sovereign act of regeneration and revelation within the sinner,
raised to walk in newness of life, washed within and renewed
by the Holy Ghost. And then thirdly, to be saved
means that God has through His Son given to you, provided for
you, He handed it to you at no cost. A perfect righteousness. A perfect righteousness. You can't even think about it,
can you? A perfect righteousness. My soul, what a gift. And it's the absence of this
righteousness that brought about the fall of Israel. And it's
the absence of this righteousness that's destroying men and women
in religion today. Paul said they're ignorant of
God's righteousness. That's the problem. They don't
know. They can't see it. They won't
have it. They won't receive it. Why? Because they're in darkness.
In darkness. They're being ignorant. of God's
righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness,
had not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the
law for righteousness to everyone, every single one that believes. What does it mean to be saved?
It means to have freely given to me by another a perfect righteousness
before God. All that the law and justice
demands from the sinner was accomplished in the life and death of Jesus
Christ. Every jot and tittle of the law
obeyed in perfect motive, thought, and deed. He has exalted the
law and made it honorable. And it's utter foolishness for
a sinful man whose righteousnesses are as filthy rags and whose
person is altogether unclean to talk about accomplishing a
righteousness before God. It's utter foolishness. I believe this book teaches believers
to do good works, to give, to help, to show compassion, to
walk uprightly in this present evil world. But it nowhere teaches
any man to work out a righteousness of his own. It condemns that. Paul took his pharisaical hopes
of righteousness and put them where they belonged. He said,
I took them out and put them on the dung heap. Put them on
the dung heap. And he cried out to God. He said,
oh, that I might be found in Christ. Not having my own righteousness. Oh, I don't want to be found
in mine. It's not even righteous in my
eyes. I can't even imagine what it appears in God. Oh, he said,
I don't want to be found in my own righteousness which is of
the law, but that which is through the faith or faithfulness of
Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith. In our appointed
head and representative, we cannot be charged with sin. Can you imagine such a thing?
A man who cannot be charged with sin. David, now I'm not trying to
encourage you to sin, I'm trying to make a point here. King David,
a man after God's own heart, stood on a roof and lusted after
a woman. Saw a woman taking a bath and
lusted after her. Couldn't have her, so he took
her husband and plotted his murder. And took him out and set him
out in the forefront of battle and commanded his generals to
withdraw and leave the man out there all by himself. Get him
killed. And then he took his wife and
he took her for his own. This is a man after God's own
heart. He could not be charged with
sin. You can't imagine that, can you? He could not. You know why? Because
God charged his sins to Christ. He was charged, alright. They
were charged to Him. He was David's head. He was David's
Lord. He was David's substitute. And
God took his sins and charged those sins to him. Our sins were laid on him, Isaiah
said. He took our place before the
bar of God and the heavy hand of justice, exacted from impayment
in full. Listen to this. Listen to what
David said. And no doubt, he said these things
in the light of what had already taken place in his life. Blessed
is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered.
Blessed is the man to whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity, and
in whose spirit there is no guile. It says in 2 Corinthians 5, That God was in Christ reconciling
a world of lost sinners unto Himself. Now listen, not imputing
their trespasses unto them. Oh, where were they charged?
Charged to Him. Charged to Him. That's not based
on what you did or what you're going to do or some potential
in you to do something. That's based on sovereign mercy.
Sovereign mercy. Believers are the only people
on the top side of God's green earth that cherish and cling
and rejoice in an accomplished salvation. It's already done. It's already accomplished. And
our head is already seated. He secured our salvation at the
right hand of God. He guaranteed it. He's our guarantor. And he's seated at the right
hand of God. If there were anything left undone,
Christ could not and would not have risen from the dead. And
then fourthly, what does it mean to be saved? It means that God
Himself has engaged the fullness of His person and the fullness
of His power to preserve, protect, mature, and usher into glory
all His elect. If God be for us, Can you hear what I'm telling
you this morning? If God be for you, who's going to be against you?
Huh? Who's going to separate you from
His love? Who's going to separate you from
His justice? Who's going to condemn you before
Him? He's the justifier. If God be for you. Well, who's
God for? He's for His elect. Who's that? That's those who believe. Well,
who's that? That's who's saved. And that's
what we're talking about this morning. What's that mean to
be saved? Well, it means that God Himself
has engaged the fullness of His person and power to preserve
and protect and mature and save me to the uttermost. There's
no way our puny minds can even begin to calculate or comprehend
what that means. Eternity! Eternity! Providence. Every single act
of Providence. All things working together.
And creation. And salvation. All. All of it engaged to save your
soul. What does it take to save a sinner?
All things. That's what it takes. All things. Salvation is not a merciful whim
of God seeing the awful plight of humanity. It's not God feeling
sorry for the sinner. Salvation is the eternal, sovereign,
unchangeable purpose and will of God to save a people for His
glory. God saves men and women on purpose. We need to get used to that.
We need to think on that every single day. God saves men on
purpose. Nothing left to chance. Nothing
left to circumstance. Everything in its appointed time.
He worketh all things after the counsel of His own will. And then, fifthly, what does
it mean to be saved? It means liberty, freedom, and
a good hope through grace. The Apostle Paul's Gospel set
men free. It didn't put them in chains.
It set them free. Our Lord told us there in John chapter 10 when
He gave us that parable of the shepherd and his sheep. He said
He called His sheep out and He put His sheep out before Him.
He didn't say He put collars on them and held a rope. He put them out. Why? Because they were obedient. They
listened to the shepherd. They listened for the shepherd.
They wanted to stay in the earshot of the shepherd. And when the
shepherd spoke, they heard his voice. And they followed him
everywhere he went. They followed him. It set men
free. He said it blotted out the handwriting
of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us,
and took it out of the way and nailed it to his cross. Now he
said, let no man, I don't care who he is, Don't you let any
preacher, don't you let any deacon, don't you let anybody in your
family, I don't care how close they are, let no man therefore
judge you in meat or in drink or in respect of a holy day or
of a new moon or sabbath day. Those things are just shadows.
Christ is the body. He's the body. He's the embodiment. He is that which gives life and
detail to the shadows. These things he calls the rudiments. You ever look that word up? That
means rudimentary or basic principles of the world. Touch not, taste
not, and handle not. That pretty much sums up what
they call the gospel. Touch not, taste not, handle
not. But in Christ, we who were captives
are free men, and we're free to serve Him. Free to love Him. Free to rejoice in Him and hope
in Him. There isn't anything else. And I tell you this, believers
aren't looking for something else. They're not looking for
something else. They want this. I don't want
that. I'll be honest with you. I hear
men preach and begin talking about men's works and this and
that and the next thing. It just makes me sick. It turns
my stomach. There ain't no hope in it. Ain't
no hope in it. My mother, I'm going to step
on some toes in here because some of you old enough to probably
like it. But dessert to her was buttermilk and bread. I see some of them going like
this. Buttermilk and bread. She pinched it up. To her, that
was like eating Frosted Flakes. She loved it. But boy, it wasn't
to me. I'd get a big bite of it and
it just, wow. I didn't want it in my mouth. And that's the way I feel about
this, what this world rejoices in and eats. It's buttermilk
to me. I don't like it.