Skip to main content

What Must I do to be Lost?


“Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” That is what the Philippian jailer asked Paul and Silas in Acts 16:30. His question was posed because an earthquake opened the doors of the prison that housed the missionaries, but Paul and Silas chose not to escape. The jailer was touched by their choice to stay put, and then he knew that these men truly possessed something different. 

 

The duo answered his question by telling him, “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved, you and your household (v.31).” This shows us there is something we must do in order to be saved. They did not tell the Philippian that all people go to heaven automatically; each person must make the personal choice to believe in, or trust in, Jesus and His work on the cross. 

 

If you want the answer to the question to be nothing, then the question needs to be “What must I do to be lost?” Some might say that in order to be lost we need to do something terrible, like commit a violent crime or worship some false idol. But that is not true. We do not need to do anything to be lost, because we are all lost by birth. Romans 5:12 says, “Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned.”

 

It really is that simple. Our eternal destiny is not decided after a careful analysis of the way we lived our lives, it is decided the second we choose to put our trust in Jesus. Belief plus nothing results in salvation; unbelief plus everything results in condemnation. 

 

What must you do to be lost? Nothing, you are born separated from God in your sins. What must you do to be saved? Just believe. Put your trust in what Jesus has already done.

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

To Save a Life

(Like my blog about the peace symbol, this blog was written as a default response to all the parents, students, and other people who are asking my opinion of To Save a Life.) By now you have probably heard of the movie To Save a Life, which opened nation-wide in theaters on January 22nd. The movie deals with so many issues that teens face today, like suicide, cutting, drinking, drugs, premarital sex, teen pregnancy, and abortion. At first glance this movie looks like an awesome resource that we should recommend for our teens, parents, youth pastors, and youth workers. But a closer look at the movie reveals a few disturbing things. For starters, according to pluggedin.com, there are 2 uses of the “A” word, 5 uses of hell (used as a curse word), and once the “D” word is used. There are other crude terms used to describe a girl, and crude terms for referring to sexual activity. There is also a bedroom scene that shows a girl removing a boy’s shirt, then afterwards the girl putting he...
38 comments
Read more

Catechism #15

Q. By what sin did our first parents fall from their original condition? 
A. Our first parents’ sin was eating the forbidden fruit. The first sin we see in the Bible was in the eating of the forbidden fruit by Adam and Eve. But as we saw last week, there are sins of commission and omission. The eating of the fruit was an act of commission—a sin that was committed in the Garden of Eden. But before Eve ever took her first bite, a few sins of omission occurred that led up to the sin of commission. First, notice that it was Eve, not Adam, that did all the talking with the serpent in Genesis 3. Yet it was Adam, not Eve, who was created as the spiritual leader of the family. For whatever reason Adam abdicated his role as the spiritual leader and stood silently by as Eve ate the fruit. After Eve’s bite, she gave it to Adam, and he ate it too. Not only did Adam omit his role as leader, Eve omitted her trust in the goodness of God. Not only did she misquote God ...
Post a Comment
Read more

All Things To All Men

One of our favorite verses to use in our evangelism methods is where Paul said that he “becomes all things to all men” so that he might “by all means save some (I Corinthians 9:22).” This is certainly a good idea if we keep it in its proper context and application. For example, I remember a time in high school where I knew a kid that loved skateboarding. Being the chicken that I am, I was never a skateboarder. All he would talk about was skating, and I knew none of his lingo. But to help develop a relationship with him (he was new to our church and didn’t know many people), I brushed up on my skating lingo so I could ask if he had done any sick ollies lately (impressed?). This would be like Paul saying “to the skateboarder, I became a skateboarder.” This is effective and necessary. But then there are the people that use this verse to justify doing sinful things in the name of evangelism. The first one that comes to mind is about drinking. Some people will go into the bars to evan...
23 comments
Read more