“What Must I Do To Be Saved?”

The Bible's answer to man’s most important question.
By H. A. IRONSIDE, Litt.D.
WITH the answer of St. Paul so clearly given in the Holy Scripture to the question propounded by the awakened Philippian jailer, it seems almost needless for anyone else to attempt an added reply to it. But owing to the many misconceptions in the minds of inquirers as to the very meaning of the word “saved” and as to what is involved in believing in the Lord Jesus Christ, it may be both wise and profitable to consider anew this question and answer with some degree of care.
First, let us ask, What is implied in this term “saved”? Saved in what sense, and from what? It would be well to try to put ourselves in the place of the jailer in order to understand what he meant when he used the word “saved” as he cried out, “What must I do to be saved?” (Acts 16: 30.) Remember, he was neither a Jewish rabbi nor a Christian apologist. He could not, in the very nature of things, have meant to imply some deep, theological mystery regarding the meaning of salvation. But he was a sinner and he knew it. He realized he was in bondage to iniquity. He dreaded Divine wrath. Therefore, to be saved must have meant for him, deliverance from an accusing conscience and from the control of sin over his life. It must also have meant deliverance from the judgment which he recognized his sins deserved. All of these are involved in this word “saved” and are just as true for us to-day as for him so long ago.
All Have Sinned.
We have all sinned. We are all under the dominion of sin in the flesh—slaves to an evil nature, which leads us constantly into violation of the Divine will. Therefore, we are all exposed to the wrath of God because of our many offenses, both willful and unpremeditated. How then, may we be saved from that which every awakened sinner knows he richly deserves? How may we obtain a purged conscience and a sense of peace with God, resting on the knowledge of His forgiveness and our clearance before the bar of Divine justice? How may we be delivered from living in sin and enabled to walk in newness of life? All this is involved in being saved. What then, must we do in order to enter into this blessedness?
It may be easier to explain, first, how not to be saved, and then take up the positive side of the question afterward. We cannot be saved by changing our religious views, either from paganistic idolatry or Judaistic legality to the dogmas of Christianity. Simply to turn from the tenets of one group to those of another is not salvation. A mere shifting of intellectual ideas religiously will not give the deliverance for which we long. Christianity, viewed as a system of doctrines and practices, does not save anyone. Neither Roman Catholicism nor any type of Protestantism will save the souls of their adherents; nor will Modernism or Fundamentalism, viewed simply as controversial distinctions, avail to bring about new birth or give a sense of freedom from condemnation. One might be a zealous advocate of any one of these groups or of their creeds and not be a child of God at all.
In the second. place, salvation is not mere reformation of life or the acceptance of high ethical ideals. These may indeed save from much that is debasing and tending to misery and wretchedness in this life, for sin is ever degrading and decency is always uplifting as far as human experience is concerned. But no change of behavior alone can save the soul of one who is a sinner in the sight of God and give the knowledge of acceptance with Him.
Religious ordinances or sacraments cannot save, however sacred and Scriptural in their place all these may be. Ritualistic ceremonies cannot effect the regeneration of a lost soul. Neither can self-effort of any kind. Apart from Christ, all religious rites are just empty forms, which are of no avail to justify a guilty sinner before God.
No law-works of any kind can fit one for fellowship with the Holy One or insure the eternal security of him who thus endeavors to save himself by his own striving after righteousness. We are told in the Word of God that salvation is “not of works, lest any man should boast” (Eph. 2: 9). Therefore, all that is merely human is barred out as a procuring cause of salvation.
But now, having noticed some things by which we cannot be saved, let us squarely face the answer given in God’s own Word. as to how this great blessing of eternal salvation may become ours.
To many, the simple answer of Paul to the question of the jailer seems utterly incomplete. He replied, when asked what one must do to be saved, by saying, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.” And that very night, as the Gospel message was proclaimed in his home, the jailer and all his house received the message and entered into peace with God.
Men say today, “This is far too easy a way,” and insist that something more than believing is necessary. But the Word of God still stands and its testimony is clear. “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.” What is involved in this? It is not believing about the Lord Jesus that saves. We may accept as historical facts all the great events of the life of Jesus and not be saved at all. To believe on Him is to trust Him—to rely upon Him alone for salvation. This, the careless, self-satisfied man will never do. It is only the repentant one who will cast away all self-confidence and trust in Christ alone. To do this is to be saved, and to be saved means to be delivered from condemnation and to be justified before the very God we have sinned against. The reason God can “be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus” (Rom. 3: 26) is because His blessed Son, took our place in judgment, was made sin in our stead, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him (2 Cor. 5: 21).
As If We Had Never Sinned.
On the Cross, He finished the work that saves. When we believe the record God has given and so put our trust in the One who settled the sin question to the Divine satisfaction, we are saved. We stand before God as free from condemnation as if we had never sinned at all.
Moreover, when we thus believe, we are saved experimentally. We are born again and become part of that new creation of which the risen Christ is the Head, according as it is written, “Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost” (Titus 3: 5).
There are two aspects to salvation—judicial and experimental. As we look up in faith to Christ, we are cleared of every charge and stand in grace, justified before the throne of God. At the same moment, we are born again by the Word and Spirit of God, receiving thereby a new nature, with which is linked a life that loves holiness and hates sin. This is why the saved man no longer lives as in the former days, to gratify his selfish, worldly desires, but delights to obey God and finds his highest joy in serving the One who has saved Him.
I would not work my soul to save;
That work my Lord has done.
But I would work like any slave
For love of God’s dear Son.
If you are not saved, cease all effort to save yourself and look away in faith to Him who died for you and rose again, and is now exalted at God’s right hand, a Prince and a Saviour, who gives life and peace to all who trust Him. It may seem “too simple” a way to be saved, so far as you are concerned, but it is God’s way; and if He is satisfied to forgive and justify freely all who come to Him through His Son, should you not be satisfied with that which satisfies Him?
As you daily look up to Him for strength in the conflict with sin, He will enable you to triumph by His grace over every evil propensity and give needed power to resist the temptations of the Devil, and so you will be saved practically from the dominion of sin in the flesh. The counteracting power of the Holy Spirit will set you free from the law of sin and death as you yield yourself unto God as one alive from the dead, in faith appropriating the life of the risen Christ as your life.
This is to be saved in the full sense of the word.
“The Sunday School Times” July 8, 1944