Smith, Harold: Four Necessities To Be Saved ~ The Bible Answers Ministry

Now we're going to open our Bibles to Luke chapter thirteen. There are four things that's absolutely necessary for a person to get into heaven, and we want to look at those four things, and they're in all in one word, the word except, which simply means unless or without that, it cannot be. So in Luke chapter thirteen in verse number three, we read this: I tell you nay, but except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish. Now, John chapter three, the Gospel of John chapter three. we read in verse number three. Jesus answered and said unto him, Nicodemus, verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Except ye repent, except ye be born again. Now, Matthew chapter eighteen and verse number three. mhm The Lord said unto them, uh, fairly I say unto you, except ye be converted, become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven. One more in John's Gospel, chapter twelve. John's Gospel, chapter twelve and verse number twenty four. Verily, verily, I say unto you, except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone, but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit. Four times I read about that little word except, and every one of them is vitally connected with being into the kingdom of heaven or being saved, getting into that glorious kingdom that's coming on this earth. The first one, of course, is the first step towards salvation. Except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish. Now, that means there's no other way to get around this. There's no substitute in the Bible for repentance. Repentance is a must. You must repent, and if you don't know how to repent, then we want to tell you exactly how- what it is and how to repent, because a lot of people don't understand that, and a lot of people don't hear anything about it. I remember Brother Clark going in a place one time recently and preaching on repentance, and they told him they didn't want to hear that message. It drove people away. You don't hear people preaching about repentance. That's why we have so many professions of faith, and people go on in their sins because they've never really repented. Now, the word repent, the Catholic people take it to mean penance. Penance is do- afflicting yourself, punishing yourself, going about things, denying yourself in order to atone for your own sins. Now, that is what repentance is. I don't know whether they get, they use the same word, penance, in some of their literature that we would use the word repentance, but they have nothing in common, the two. The word repent comes from a word, a compound word after mind. It literally means a change of mind, an inward change of thinking. And it always has to do in the Bible, uh, when it comes to man, it always has to do with changing from something bad to something good, or something wrong to something right. So, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish. Repentance is a change of mind. First, it's a change of mind toward God. Acts twenty and verse twenty one, It's, uh, repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ. So it's a change of mind toward God. It's an attitude, a change of attitude toward God. People rebel against God. We're all rebels. What happened to Adam in the Garden of Eden was just simply rebellion. It says, for by one man's disobedience. He just disobeyed God. He rebelled against God. He didn't do anything we would call, uh, man would call real bad. Never killed anybody, he never swore, he never got drunk, he never committed adultery, he didn't steal anything, he didn't tell a lie, none of those things. Just a simple act of disobedience. That was rebelling against the commandment of the Lord. The Lord told him not to eat of a certain tree, he ate of that tree. And consequently, he had to change his mind toward what he had done and come back to God and say, yeah, Lord, I agree, I shouldn't have eat- I shouldn't have a- a- ate of that tree. I did wrong in eating of that tree, and it's a change of mind back toward God again. So Acts twenty and verse twenty one says it's repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ. Except ye repent, there must be a change of mind toward God. And of course, there must be a change of mind towards sin. We look at sin in the, in our own little way. Some things we think are terrible, and other things aren't so bad. That's not true in the eyes of God. Sin is sin in the eyes of God. There are sins that are worse than others, there's no doubt about that. The Bible speaks about greater sin, but sin is sin, and uh, in whatever form it might be, it's, it's sin, and it should never be looked upon lightly. And so repentance has to do with a, a, a, a turning in the mind, an inward turning, an inward change of attitude toward God on the one hand, and towards sin on the other hand. People that want to be saved and still go on in what they know to be wrong, there's no evidence of repentance there in their lives. See, there must be that change of mind, that inward change towards sin against God. It's not the idea of quitting what you're doing altogether. That's the results of repentance. Re- repentance is actually an inward change, an inward turning about. And of course, it will affect the outward eventually when you get saved. So repentance is a change of mind. Our mindset is opposite to God. God's ways are not our ways, and his thoughts are not our thoughts. As high as the heavens are above the earth, God says, so are my ways above your ways and my thoughts above your thoughts, in Isaiah chapter fifty five. In that same chapter, Isaiah chapter fifty five and verse seven, it says, let the un- let the unrighteous man, uh, uh, forsake his ways. I haven't got that just right, but we get it for you. Isaiah chapter 55, it says, let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts. Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts. There's a thought of repentance, uh, uh, uh, uh, forsaking your thoughts, your, your thinking, not only toward God and toward sin, but toward yourself. Everybody has preconceived ideas. For instance, there's nothing wrong with wanting to live a good life, nothing wrong with cha- turning over a new leaf, as it were, and quitting some bad habits and trying to live a respectable, decent, wholesome life. There's nothing wrong with that, but if your thoughts about that is that that's going to save you, then you've got to repent of those thoughts. You've got to change your mind. Don't change your ways. Let- keep going that way. There's nothing wrong with that. But the sad thing is people trust in that, and they trust in their ways and that what they're doing, and and and that's not repentance. Repentance is when I change my thoughts. Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and let him return to the Lord. That's the essence of repentance. It's not confession. Confession is something you do with your mouth. Repentance is something you do with your mind. Confess- confession and conversion, it's not conversion either. Conversion has to do with your morals, your ways, but repentance is not something moral, it's something mental. It's an inward change of mind or heart towards sinning against God and towards sin itself and toward God and toward your own way. All we like sheep have gone astray. We turn everyone to his own way. We must forsake our own way. That's repentance. We must change our mind about our own way. Whether it's, whether there's anything wrong with the way morally or not, we must still change our mind about our own way. We cannot be saved by our own way. The book of Jeremiah chapter ten verse twenty three, I think it is, says, it's not in man that walketh to direct his own steps. Proverbs chapter fourteen and verse twelve says that there is a way that seemeth right to a man, but the end thereof is the way of death. Nothing wrong with going in a way that seems right and doing the right thing, but to trust in that is what's bad. You must have a change of mind about that. And I think this is the more difficult area of repenting. We don't have much trouble to know that we disobey God, we break his laws, and we should have a change of attitude toward God. We don't have much trouble in, in uh, saying, well, we do bad things, we should change our mind about that. But somehow people have got the idea that I'm better than the other fellow. I'm not as bad as those other people, and surely I've got a chance to make it. I'm going to take, make a dash for it, as it were, and hope for the best. There's the area you've got to repent. You've got to have a change of mind about that. You cannot save yourself. You have to give yourself up, as it were, and let the Lord do that for you. So accept ye, repent. That's a change of mind toward God, towards sin, and towards your own way. Then I read in John chapter three and verse three, except the man be born again, he cannot see or cannot enter the kingdom of God. Now the, the s- the new birth, the word born again literally means born from above. Our first birth is from below. Our first birth is a natural birth. Our first birth is a human birth. Jesus said in John three, it says in verse six, that which is born of flesh is flesh. That's the human birth, and it's, and it's got nothing to do with the, with the new birth. The new birth, that which is born of spirit is spirit. It's an entirely different birth altogether. And Jesus said, first, except you repent, you're going to perish, and except you be born again, you cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven. You have to be born again. You couldn't live in heaven without being born again. The only people that live in heaven is people that have eternal life, and you can't get life without a birth. That's a rule of the universe. Nothing that's living ever, e- e- ever come about by except by a birth. And, uh, it was all born. Every living creature had a birth, apart from God creating it to begin with, that they, they all had a birth. And you've got to have a birth in order to get into heaven. You've got to have eternal life to get there. You can't get there in human life. And First Corinthians one fifteen and verse fifty, it says, flesh and blood, that's humanity. Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God. That's very plain language. That's an impossibility. God could never take me into heaven just the way I am right now because I'm flesh and blood, and it's, and it's diseased, it's, it's aging, it's, and it's perishing, and it, and eventually, if the Lord doesn't come, I'm going to die. But the, so you've got to have eternal life, and you've got to be made complete and perfect, body, soul, and spirit, in order to get into heaven. And that's all involved in the new birth. Except a man be born again. Except ye repent is a change of mind. Except ye be born again is a change of nature. See, our nature is wrong to begin with. It's diseased, it's defiled, it's corrupted, and we need a, a change of nature altogether in order to be saved. And when a person is born again, there are two things in the Word of God that we're said to be born of. We're said to be born of the Spirit of God. That's the Spirit that gives us the life that Christ come to die to provide for us eternal life, and that we're born again by the word of God in First Peter one and verse twenty three. Those two things together, the spirit of God takes the word of God, faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God. The spirit of God takes the word of God, which is the seed of the new birth, and he, and he, and that is conceived in the heart of a person, and they believe it, and eventually they receive what the, the message of, uh, of the, of the gospel, and they become born again. Except a man be born again, he cannot see, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. Proverbs chapter twenty and verse seven says that, that the, uh, the, uh, ca- the, uh, spirit of man is like the candle of the Lord that lights all the inward parts of the being. And the spirit in man, that spirit that was in Adam to begin with, is that part of Adam that can communicate with God and give him God consciousness. The soul of Adam gave him earth, world, and self-consciousness, knew where he was and what he was doing. And the body, of course, was just the house that he lived in. When Adam died, that spirit in man was separated from God. It never ceased to be, it just separated from God. And there was no communication, no, no fellowship, no harmony. There was talking, but there was no harmony between that fallen creature and, and the, and the God that had created him. But that spirit in man is the candle of the Lord, and he can light that again. And he lights it by the Spirit of God and by the Word of God. The entrance of thy word giveth light, it giveth understanding to the simple. And that's the spirit of man that receives that light. Though it's separated from God, though we're spiritually dead to God, God can speak and the dead can live. Lazarus was physically dead, and God said, Lazarus, come forth, and he that was dead came forth. If God could speak to a person that was physically dead, and he could come forth, God can speak to a person that's spiritually dead, and they can come forth, as it were. So the spirit in man, there is a spirit in man, and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth him understanding, in Job chapter thirty and verse eight. That's how you become born again. God speaks, God lights the spirit of man. He, he lights us, he, he enlightens us by his word, and, and uh, we come to understand that we're sinners. We come to understand that we need to repent of sin. We come to understand that Christ died for our sins, and, and in d- in all this, the Spirit of God is working and conceiving the seed in us, and that's how we've come to be born again. Man has three parts, spirit, soul, and body, and there are three great truths of salvation. Justification that has to do with the spirit of man. That's something takes place once for all. It's a complete act in itself. It's a legal word whereby God acquits, legally acquits a sinner of all their sins, and not only acquits him, but he he banishes them away. He'll remember them no more, and that person is justified in the sight of God. Somebody as well describe it, just as if I never sinned. That has to do with the spirit of man. The soul of man is being sanctified from day to day. It's being set apart from the evil world in which we live. And the body of man is, is, is slated, as it were, for glorification in a day to come, that is of those that are saved. So the three parts of man are vitally connected with the three great doctrines of salvation, justification, sanctification, and glorification. Except a man repent, there must be a change of mind. Except a man be born again, there must be a change of nature before you can get into heaven. Then in Matthew chapter eighteen and verse three, except ye be converted and become as little children, ye cannot enter the kingdom of heaven. Now, conversion, conversion is the results of salvation. It's not the means of salvation, it's the c- results of salvation. Conversion has to do with our ways. Repentance has to do with our minds, our inward attitude and mind, but conversion has to do with our ways. We- we are converted, we're changed in our ways. And Jesus said, except ye be converted and become his little children, ye cannot enter the kingdom of heaven. Conversion is something that's moral. Conversion is something to do with our, uh, our outward. If we convert this building, we change it visibly, so people see it's converted, it's changed over into another type of a building. So, uh, when you repent of your sins, knowing you're a sinner against God, and of course realizing Christ died for your sins, you trust in the working of the Spirit and the Word of God, and you become born again, there will be some changes in your ways, some more or less. The Lord put it this way, some thirtyfold, fold, some sixtyfold, fold, and some hundredfold. fold. There will be fruit, there will be a change take place. That's what the word convert means. It means to turn about. Now, you don't turn about outwardly in order to get saved. You do inwardly, that's repentance. That inward turning about is repentance, but conversion is the outward turning about of, of, of, and, and the results of that. It's the fruit of repentance. It means that when I see my sin before God and repent of that sin and trust in Christ as my Savior and become born again, I have a new nature, and of course, from a new nature comes new things. Old things begin to pass away, and new things come on. That's conversion. The Lord has converted me from what I was to what he wants me to be, and he's converting me, and this is something that goes on constantly. Peter was saved for a while, but he got away from the Lord, and the Lord said, when thou art converted, strengthen the brothers. That is, when you're turned around again, turned back again. So conversion is absolutely necessary. It's vital to salvation. It shows the inworking. It's the outward display of the in- inworking of the Spirit of God in the lives of people. To profess to be saved and have no fruit whatsoever, no outward change in your life whatsoever. There's something radically wrong there. You can't take the Lord and the power of the gospel into your life by faith without it exploding in some measure. It's God's dynamite, uh, without it exploding in some measure and making some changes, outward changes in your life. That's what conversion is. Except ye be converted and become as little children. Now, the little idea of little children there in chapter eighteen of Matthew is, is believing. It goes on to say about a little child that believes in me, and the idea is it's the simplicity of a child in believing that's in view there. That's how you get in on God's salvation, uh, is is just the simplicity of believing what God says. A child will believe about anything the parents tell them. They'll believe the world is square. If you, if you, uh, told a small child the world was a cube, square, they'd believe that. They believe about anything. They believe about Santa Claus, they believe about the Sandman, and they believe all that, uh, because they're easy believers, and they trust their parents. And, uh, when you, and, and that's the essence of faith. It's the simplicity of just believing God. God never tells us about a Sandman or a, or Santa Claus or anything like that, but what he tells us, the simplicity of faith, is just believing what God says. It's nothing more. So except ye be converted, that's a change of mind. Except ye be born again, that's a change of nature. Except ye be, uh, uh, except ye repent, rather, that's a change of mind. Except ye, uh, uh, be born again, that's a change of nature. Except ye be converted, that's a change of ways. There's no getting into heaven apart from that. But then again, in John chapter twelve, I read about the Lord Jesus saying, except a corn of wheat fall in the ground and die in a bite of the loam. He's talking about his death. He's talking about going to the cross. He's getting ready to go to the cross. And what he's saying here, unless I die on the cross, it wouldn't do anybody any good to repent, and nobody could ever be born again, and nobody could ever be converted in the true sense. He says it's absolutely necessary for you to repent to be saved. It's absolutely necessary for you to to be born again to be saved. It's absolutely necessary to be converted to be saved, but it's a- but first and foremost, it's absolutely necessary that I die. Paul told them in Acts seventeen, I think in verse two or three, that Christ must need suffer. Jesus told the disciples on the Emmaus Road, ought not Christ to have suffered these things and to entered into his glory? He came into the world for one express purpose, to be that corn of wheat that would fall in the ground and die so he could bring forth fruit unto God. Had he never died, there'd be no life, there'd be no fruit for God. So the whole purpose of him coming into the world was to lay down his life. Now he said, except I do that, there'll be no fruit for God, and there'll be no salvation for sinners. These are musts. Christ had to die. You have to repent. You have to be born again. You have to be converted in order to get into heaven. May the Lord help you, if you're not saved, to seriously consider the importance of these things that the Lord says there's no exception to these things. They're absolute musts in order to get into heaven. Shall we pray? Our Father, we bow to thank thee for the word of the living God. We thank thee that we have this light in the dark world in which we live, to enlighten our darkened minds that have been darkened by sin, that we might see the light of thy word and understand the simple and wonderful provision that Thou has made for sinners, that they might be saved. We pray for any in our little company or anywhere else where the gospel might be going out at this very hour. We pray for souls to be saved, for sinners to come to see their need and put their trust in Christ. So we pray in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.