You Must Obey God’s Will to be Saved!
-------------------
by Bro. Mark Householder ------------------
Key concepts: the church, conversion, obedience, righteousness, God’s Will, the
Good News, the Gospel, das Evangelium
Introduction
I am not here
this morning to teach you that you must be a member of a denomination to go to
heaven or to be saved! (Repeat) What I DO want to show you is that
you MUST do God’s will to go to be saved!
Body
1) Obedience to
God’s will is the deciding factor in saving you!
1)
Obedience to God’s will makes you free!
2)
Obedience to God’s will makes you righteous!
3)
Obedience to God’s wils saves you!
4)
Obedience to God’s will causes you to go to heaven!
5)
Obedience to God’s will adds you to the church!
2) Obedience to
God’s will is taught throughout the ENTIRE Bible! Not just a part of if!
(REPEAT)
There
are many scriptures which teach obedience.
Let us focus on a few of them.
1) Genesis
4:6-7
“6 Then the Lord said to Cain, ‘Why are you
angry? Why is your face downcast? 7 If you do what is right, will
you not be accepted? But if you do not
do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but
you must master it.’”
2) Ecclesiastes
12:13-14
“13 Now all has been heard; here is the
conclusion of the matter: Fear God and
keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. 14 For God will bring every deed
into judgment, including every hidden thing, whether it is good or evil.”
3) Romans
6:16-18
“16 Don’t you know that when you offer
yourselves to someone to obey him as slaves, you are slaves to the one whom you
obey—whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience,
which leads to righteousness? 17 But
thanks be to God that, though you used
to be slaves to sin, you wholeheartedly obeyed the form of teaching to which
you were entrusted. 18 You
have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness.”
4) I
John 5:3
5) John
14:15, 15:10
* The two
greatest commands! Matt. 22:37-40 cf
Luke 10:27 These were actually two commands from the law (the first 5
books of the Bible, written by Moses)
Deut. 6:5 & Lev. 19:18.
That’s why Jesus said “All the law and the prophets...” ref.to
the law; the books of Moses.
3) Example:
In
a football game there are rules. The
playing field is very small compared to the territory outside it. No one would question that the ball was out
of bounds if it landed in the stands, would they. Life is like that. Yet
many in the world would have us believe that the entire stadium was fair play
and that all seated therein were partaking in the game. How absurd.
The
New Testament addresses this fallacy.
Matthew 7:13-16
“13 Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is
the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter
through it. 14 But small is
the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it. 15 Watch out for false
prophets. They come to you in sheep’s
clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves. 16 By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, for
figs from thistles?”
The last part tells me that I’ll be able to “recognize
them.” This is in response to those who
believe that we are in NO way to judge or determine what others are about.
4) False
teachers
I Tim. 6:3-4
I Cor. 15:1-3
Gal. 1:6-10 False teachers shall be damned!
* So, what is
the Gospel? I appreciate the German
word das Evangelium. That’s the word in
German for the gospel but transliterated it would be closer to ‘the evangelical
message’. It is somewhat easy, without
a knowledge of the origin of the words (etymologies), to lose the meaning; to
lose the nuance. Has this helped to
clarify the definition of the word a bit?
Now, specifically and in brief, what is the gospel?
1) We a all sinners, every one of us! “For all have sinned...” Romans
3:22-24
2) That doesn’t mean that we are all controlled by sin but
that we commit sin. (Compare with
Paul’s comments about his difficulties doing what is right and “..You, however,
are not contrrolled by the sinful nature...”
3) We are all very weak and, in reality, powerless
to conquer sin. We can’t do what we
should.
4) We deserve condemnation, to be damned, accursed. Spiritual Capital Punishment - forever.
5) Jesus took all that away through his supreme sacrifice,
crucifixion. Greater love hath no man
than to lay down his life for his fellow man.
The unblemished Passover Lamb (Jesus) was slain to be a propitiation for
our sins. Someone else suffered the
death penalty (physically) in our stead.
He is THE High Priest who entered the Holy of Holies, once and
for all, that God would blot out our sins and remember them no more.
Hebrews 7:1-4, 11-25
That’s the Good
News! That’s the Gospel; the Evangelical
Message! That’s what grace is all
about! There is no other gospel.
So, we deserve to die for our sins but won’t if we are
in Christ. We get into Christ by
obedience through faith.
5) What must I
do to be saved? This is the same
question as “What must I do to be in the body of Christ?” and “What must I do
to become a member of the church (the body)?”
That is to say that the true church requires nothing more and nothing
less than that which was required of lost souls in the first century church.
Remember that Jesus said “If ye love me ye will keep my
commands.”
You must: Hear - Ro. 10:17, Mt. 7:24-27.
Believe
- Heb. 11:6, Mk. 16:15-16.
*But
not by faith only, which would be a dead
faith - Jas. 2:24, Jn. 12:42.
Repent
- Ac. 2:38, Ac. 17:30, Lk. 13:3.
Submit
to baptism - Ac. 2:38, All
conversions in the Bible include this!
Live
a righteous life/remain faithful - Rev.
2:10, Ro. 8:1-17.
Conclusion