Someone bit!

As some of you have guessed, my starting a new thread, entitled "You think you are saved but are you, really?" in one of the Christian discussion groups, was to bait some members of that group. For those of you who written me, I apologize for not replying immediately. I wanted to wait for someone to bite before explaining myself.

Today, someone bit. Here is his response to my post:

How ridiculous.

This post reminds me of the old baptist churches that I used to go to when I was a kid where at the end of EVERY service the preacher or leader would ask all of us 20 times " are you sure you're saved? are you sure?? do you really know? if you died tonight would you go to hell? are you sure you're saved? do you know for sure? you might think you are but you might not be. you have to be sure. are you sure? do you really know if you're going to heaven? are you sure? you've gotta be sure. so are you sure? you can't just think you are, you've gotta know. do you know? are you sure?? "

What a great way to instill doubt into a child's heart concerning his salvation! I remember the same kids going down front to "get saved" almost every week.

No where in Scripture did Jesus, Paul, or anyone else write a letter asking 5, 659 times "ARE YOU SURE YOU'RE SAVED?????"'

Here's what's required to be born again:

Romans 10:9-10
"That if you will confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you WILL be saved. For with the heart man believes unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation."

This is the qualification to know if you're born again.

Stop trying to make people question their salvation, man. If you want to ask them something, then ask them if they have obeyed Romans 10:9-10. That settles it!

Or ask them "Do you believe that Jesus is Lord and that God raised Him from the dead?" That's the qualification! A person either believes it or they don't.



Here's my response:

Asking "Do you believe that Jesus is Lord" is precisely what my post is about.

In the first part of my post I equated "believing in Jesus" with "being saved".

Afterward, in my post, I used the two interchangeably.

If replacing every instance of "Are you really saved?" with "Do you believe that Jesus is Lord?" is required before you are able to read my post objectively, feel free to do so.

But to dwell on that point would be missing my main point.

We know from Luke 13:23-27 (see my initial post for the text), that there are people, who congregate with the Body of Christ and think that they are saved but are not. If you don't like this statement, you can argue with our Lord.

If they are not made aware of their delusion of being saved, they will spend the other side of eternity in hell.

Why are they not aware of their unsaved state?

Most often, in my encounters, no one took the time to fully explain what it means to believe that Jesus is Lord.

In fact, the kids, that you mentioned, that continues to walk down the aisle every week "to be saved" (irregardless of whether they are saved or not) is a prime example of people who do not have a full understanding of what it takes to be saved. If they did, would they be confused about their salvation simply by someone questioning if they are really saved? Of course not!

The main problem is that in the past several decades, the Christian evangelical movement has presented a Madison Avenue'esque version of the Gospel. It is an unbalanced version which emphasized Jesus as our savior without counterbalancing it with emphasis on Jesus as Lord.

Too often, people gets the false impression that Jesus is this cosmic genie to which one marches down the aisle, says the magic words and (bling) one gets a "get out of hell" card and one's life suddenly becomes wonderful.

In my ministry, that false impression causes more kids to stumble than anything else.

I'm not saying that this misconception is being preached. I'm, however, saying that the de-emphasis of Jesus as Lord causes the misperception.

Too often, it is not explained that to believe that Jesus is Lord:
1) You have to believe that Jesus is your Lord, i.e., you are willing to obey Jesus.
2) You have to believe that Jesus is the Lord of all, capable of protecting and providing for you in all circumstances when you are being obedient to Him.

That's why I quoted Matthew 6:31-33 in my initial post.

So do not worry, saying, What shall we eat? or What shall we drink? or What shall we wear? For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.

These three verses are an illustration of
1) believing Jesus is your Lord (seek first his kingdom and his righteousness)
2) believing Jesus is the Lord of all (all these things will be given to you as well)


If you fail to believe that Jesus is your Lord, do you really believe that Jesus is Lord?
If you fail to believe that Jesus is the Lord of all, do you really believe that Jesus is Lord?

And if you do not believe that Jesus is Lord, are you saved?

That is why I posted the story of Blondin. If you are not willing get on when Jesus says get on, do you really believe? Do you believe that He is your lord? Do you believe that He is the Lord of all?

And if not, are you saved?

I do not regret asking if someone is really saved. Those who are saved will not loose their salvation. If my question causes one single person who is not saved to re-examine if Jesus is his or her Lord and cause that person to accept Jesus as Lord, the minor discomfort of those who are already saved is a small price to pay.

p.s., As you can see, my unhappiness with the state of the Church is not that there are members who are not pursuing the Kingdom of God. It's because there are member who are misled by a cheap Gospel and they may very well be excluded from the Kingdom of God and pay for their ignorance with their souls.