Salvation is the greatest reward and also the ultimate that God will offer His true worshippers, How will one be saved? who will be saved? and where will one enjoy salvation? are questions whose answers make this treatise interesting and enlightening.
Ordinarily, to be saved is to be rescued or delivered from death, sickness, accident, danger or trouble of any kind. One can therefore say, I was saved from death in a motor accident, I was saved from a terrible sickness, I was saved from a fire disaster, and so on.
But the keeper of the prison into which Paul and Silas were thrust asked, “What must I do to be saved?” He meant more than the ordinary salvation of rescue from danger or trouble. The answer of Paul and Silas was straightforward: “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.” (Acts 16:30,31) What then is salvation in reference to the context?
Salvation or “to be saved” in the context of the jailer’s inquiry, is deliverance or to be delivered from sin and all the evils it brought into the world including death. In other words, it means everlasting life. One who ir saved is the one to whom God Almighty through Jesus Christ has granted eternal life. It is a gift from God because: there is nothing man can do that is commensarate to it. “For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord” -Rom, 6:23.
Said the Psalmist, “Salvation belongeth unto the LORD. Thy blessing is upon Thy people” (Ps. 3:8) Furthermore, he said: “He that is out God is the God of salvation, and unto GOD the Lord belong the issues from death.” (Ps. 68:20) It goes without saying therefore that it is only God through Jesus Christ who can give salvation and/or eternal life. And the only way to obtain salvation is through sincere belief in Christ Jesus, the Way the Truth and Life, who only is the Mediator between God and men. – John 14:6; 1 Tim 2:5
Jesus said: “He that believeth on me hath everlasting life.” (John 6:47) The answer of Paul and Silas to the jailer was, “Believe on the Lord. Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved…” Acts 16:30,31) False teachers play upon these and similar texts the Bible to make people think that salvation is very cheap and easy to obtain. They teach that the moment one believes one is instantaneously saved.
For instance, Evangelist John R. Rice of the “Sword of the Lord Foundation”, Tennessee, U.S.A., wrote in his pamphlet, “What Must I Do To Be Saved?” thus: “Here is God’s simple way to be saved. You are a sinner, your heart is wrong. you cannot save yourself, you are already condemned. The thing you are to do then, to be saved, is to simply trust the Lord Jesus with that matter. When you trust Him, then you have God’s promise, “Thou shalt be saved”… Salvation is instantaneous…. The way is plain and YOU CAN BE SAVED THIS MOMENT if you will… YOU CAN BE SAVED RIGHT NOW, THIS MINUTE. I beg you, do it now.Turn your whole heart from sin to trust in Christ.” (Our capitals)
By this type of message many professed Christians have been deceived to develop the illusion that they are already saved whereas they are nowhere near the portals of salvation. What makes the whole thing looks ludicrous is the fact that some of them who claim to have been saved, have been found to denounce the Christian faith, and turn to other religions at the later part of their lives. And this makes a mockery of their fanatical claims,
Salvation is of the uttermost importance that it is not laid on a platter of gold to be easily obtained for merely saying “I believe in Christ”. A mere oral confession of belief in Christ is not enough to earn salvation; it calls for a life of dedication, diligence, fear of God, acquisition and application of wisdom, genuine faith manifested in good works, charity and so on. To say that salvation is instantaneous and can be obtained the moment one believes is a contradiction of the Scriptures. Said Jesus Christ: “And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold. But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.”-Matt. 24:12.13.
It is the end of one’s service to God that will determine the faith of everyone. St. Peter, in his epistolary exhortation, stated: “Receiving the END OF YOUR FAITH, even the SALVATION of your souls. of which salvation the prophets have enquired and searched diligently, who prophesied of the grace that should come unto you.”- Peter 1:9,10,
It is true, God promised to give eternal life to His worshippers but it is not intended to be enjoyed in this world of sin that will soon be destroyed. John the apostle stated: “And this is the promise that He (God) hath promised us even eternal life.” (1 John 2:25) And for the reason that it is for those who hold their faith steadfastly unto the end. St. Paul admonished: “Cast not away therefore your confidence which hath great recompense of reward. For ye have need of patience, that after ye have done the will of God. ye might receive the promise.” Continuing he said: “Now the just shall live by faith: But if any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him. But we are not of them who draw back to perdition: but of them that believe to the saving of the soul” Heb. 10:35-36.38-39,
The early apostles of Christ were not saved instantaneously, and Jesus Christ did not tell them so. When Peter asked him as to what will be the reward of those of them who had left all to follow him, his answer was to the effect that eternal life they would receive or enjoy in the world to come. Said Jesus Christ: “Verily I say unto you, there is no man that hath left house, or parents, or brethren, or wife, or children, for the kingdom of God’s sake, who shall not receive manifold more in this present time and in the world to come life everlasting”. Luke 18:28-30.
Jesus Christ also stated that it is at his second presence or coming he would begin to give reward to the faithful. He said: “The Son of Man shall come in the glory of the Father with his angels; and then he shall reward every man according to his works.” (Matt. 16:27) This understanding was portrayed by St. Paul when he stated: “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith: henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day: and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing.”-2 Tim. 4:7,8.
That belief in Jesus Christ is a vital requirement for obtaining salvation cannot be disputed. Jesus Christ himself said; ‘For God so love the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not. perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not. His Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.” (John 3:16,17: see also I John 5:11-13) The belief is not unqualified in that, according to the Scripture, it is based on the following conditions:
1. The knowledge of the truth. Christ said that one’s continuance in his word makes a “disciple indeed”. “And ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free.” (John 8:31.32) And St. Paul stated: “For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour, who will have all men to be saved. and to come to the knowledge of the truth.” 1 Tim.2:3,4.
2. The adornment of oneself with Christian qualities which are evidences of the Spirit of God in one. And St. Paul wrote of the fruits of the Spirit as comprising love. joy, peace. longsuffering. gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance, and such like. (Gal. 5:22-23) In this regard St. Peter exhorted Christians to give diligence as to add to their filth virtue, and io virtue knowledge. He went on, “And to knowledge temperance, and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness; and to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness charity. He concluded: “For these things be in you, and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ… For an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ”-2 Peter 1:5-11.
3. Good works as manifestation of one’s faith. It is clearly stated in the Bible that “faith without works is dead.” And a dead faith is incapable. of leading to the attainment of salvation (Jas. 2:15-20,26) Though salvation is given by God. as a matter of grace, it is not without faith. Thus St. Paul stated: “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast.”-Eph. 2:8,9.
4. Steadfastness till the end. Jesus Christ said that it is he who endures till the end that shall be saved. (Matt. 24:12,13) And St. Paul stated: “For we are made partakers of Christ if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast unto the end.” – Heb. 3:14; see also Rom. 6:22
It is on the strength of all this, the apostle Paul admonished the Christians at Philippi to be obedient at all times, and “work out your own salvation with fear and trembling” (Phil 2:12) “Work out your own salvation” does not imply idleness, slothfulness nor folding of hands but diligence in the service of the Lord.