Articles
Answering Sincere Questioners
Answering Sincere Questioners
By Paul R. Blake
More Bible questions: One visitor to our website asked the following question: "Will God save a person who has faith in Christ as his personal Savior but has never been baptized?"
Answer: Mark 16:16 - “He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned.” Did Jesus make baptism necessary for salvation? What are the conditions for salvation in this text? Believe and be baptized. The argument has been made that Jesus didn’t restate baptism in the second part of His statement; therefore, baptism is not a necessary condition for salvation. This is neither sound nor logical reasoning. When one states two conditions of a desired result and one of the conditions has not been met, it is not necessary to restate both conditions in the negative. The loss of a single condition is sufficient to void the desired result.
Consider the following illustration: A young boy is told to behave all evening and take his bath; and if he does, he will be permitted to go to the carnival tomorrow. It is easy to understand that he needs to do both in order to go to the carnival. If he doesn’t behave, he doesn’t get to go; it doesn’t matter at that point whether he takes his bath or not. If he does not take his bath, he will not get to go; it doesn’t matter that he behaved. We understand that based on the instructions, he had to do both. Leave either condition out and the conditions for going to the carnival have not been met.
Jesus said: “He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned.” (Mark 16:16) The Divine Son of God put two conditions in that statement: believe and be baptized. Leave belief out of the statement, and it doesn’t matter whether one is baptized. Leave baptism out of Jesus statement, and it doesn’t matter whether one believes. Both conditions must be met if one wants to meet the conditions Jesus set for salvation. I recommend doing what Jesus said without modification. Thank you for your question. I hope this helps.
A young evangelist sent the following question by email: I'd like to know all your thoughts and information about what is meant when Jesus was on the cross and said "My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me." I hear it said a lot that God at that point had to then His back on Jesus because He "became sin" and "took our sins on Himself. I personally don't think that might have been the case or meaning of Jesus saying that. I could be wrong. I'd like your help in studying this. Thanks in advance!
Answer: I will not diminish the cry of our Lord by trying to re-explain it as an intellectual exercise in which He tries to make sure He has check-listed all of the Old Testament prophecies about Him. I believe that just as He was pleading intensely and emotionally in the Garden to avoid the cross, so also He was feeling intensely alone and expressing those feelings on thee cross. The fact that the Psalmists by inspiration expressed their emotions, fears, and doubts to God does not mean that they lost their faith; it means that they were overwhelmed with fear and sorrow and were pleading for help. So also, the fact that Jesus cried out "Why have You forsaken Me?" speaks to how much He was suffering, not whether God had actually left him.
It must be understood that as the sacrifice for sin and as the One who was carrying the burden of our sin, God had to abandon Jesus to that fate. In as much as the Passover lamb is given over to death, and the scapegoat is chased off into the wilderness are both forsaken, so Jesus as the Passover lamb and scapegoat Who carried our sins had to be abandoned to die and sent away. That is Biblical.
I do not subscribe to the two contemporary schools of thought that intellectualize the temptations and emotions of Jesus, or who impose their personal paradigm of Jesus over what is written. Prayer is supposed to be an intensely honest and emotionally invested activity. To pretend to pray to God about being forsaken on the cross without wrestling with the feeling of being forsaken is dishonest. It is up to us to learn why He said it without preconceived notions of who we think Jesus is. I hope this helps.
The Search for a Quality Life
By Dee Bowman
Ecclesiastes is the answer to the perennial question, “what is life.” It gives answers in both positive and negative ways, telling us what life is and what it’s not. Ecclesiastes is also the product of a grand experiment with life.
Solomon tried all that life has to offer, plumbed the depths of every area of thought with a view to ascertaining what is good about life. He tried to find substance to life in wine, but found none. He tried to find it in folly, entertainment, but found none. He sought for a quality life with agriculture and with botanical gardens, but found none. He had hordes of servants and great wealth; he found no real joy in any of it. He tried everything. “Whatsoever mine eyes desired I kept not from them. I withheld not from my heart any joy,” he said. He found no substance to life no matter where he turned.
Solomon found some quality in good friends and good food, some in doing a good job, no matter the assignment, some in a resignation to the allotments of divine providence, but at the end of the experiment, he concluded that a good life is possible only when one fears God and keeps his commandments.
Don’t work too hard to find a quality life here. You won’t find it. (Ecc. 2:1-11)
What is Maturity?
1) Facing the truth honestly; being a person of your word.
2) Looking beyond personal comfort and gratification to the greater good.
3) Dealing with change without falling apart; keeping the stresses and worries of life from taking control.
4) Working hard and completing a job, whether supervised or not.
5) Doing the right thing regardless of what others say and do.
6) Finding more joy in giving than in receiving.
7) Bearing with an injustice without having to get even.
8) Relating to others in a consistently positive and helpful manner.
9) Showing love and respect for others in both word and deed.
10) Learning contentment based on internal attitudes rather than external circumstances. (Dr. Steve Stephens)
A Moments Wisdom
--We must die! These words are hard, but they are followed by a great happiness: it is in order to be with God that we die. (Francis of Sales; 1567-1622)
--We are at another crossroads. No question is of greater moment than this: shall we let the hostility of this world scare us into becoming diplomats on good terms with the world, the flesh and the devil, instead of flaming witnesses in a head-on collision with a godless age? (Vance Havner; 1901-1986)
--The gospel is not a secret to be hoarded but a story to be heralded. Too many Christians are stuffing themselves with gospel blessings, while millions have never had a taste. (Vance Havner)
--To assert that a world as intricate as ours emerged from chaos by chance is about as sensible as to claim that Shakespeare’s dramas were composed by rioting monkeys in a print shop. (Merrill C. Tenney, 1962)
--The most malicious kind of hatred is that which is built upon a theological foundation. (George Sarton, 1927)
--I have lived, sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth... that God governs the affairs of men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without His aid? (Benjamin Franklin)
Upcoming Sermons
11/17/24 AM & PM - Gospel Meeting with Brent Lewis
11/24/24 AM - Questions that Lead Us to Conquer; PM - Act in Haste; Repent in Leisure
