Calvary Baptist Church

Calvary Baptist Church, Grenada, MS

Holding to the truths embraced by Baptist for centuries.

Charter Three

WHAT KIND OF PEOPLE DOES GOD SAVE? GOOD OR BAD?

You ask this question and people will think you are trying to be funny. Of course, they know God saves good people. They will say so with the greatest assurance. Seeming to feel, "Sure I know the answer to that one. I am ignorant about many things, but I know I am right on this." You yourself may be thinking, "Well, is not that the answer? Doesn't God save good folks? Surely He does not save bad men." Perhaps this way of putting it is a little confusing. Better say, ''Does God save good people or sinners?'' Sinners are bad people, and bad people are sinners. The Bible calls them 'sinners', 'transgressors', 'ungodly'. To say all these mean 'bad', surely no one will deny.

Let us get the answer from God's Word to the question, "What kind of people does God save, good or bad?" The testimony from the O1d Testament Psalms 32:1 and 2, "Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man unto whom God imputeth not iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile." Isaiah 1:18, "Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord; though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool." The whole tenor of the O1d Testament teaches that God saves sinners. God's dealings with Adam and Eve in the Garden show that. All the bloody sacrifices proclaim this wonderful, gracious message.

Now look in the New Testament. The angel said to Joseph, Matthew 1:21, "And she shall bring forth a Son, and thou shall call His name JESUS; for He shall save His people from their sin." Zacharias, the father of John the Baptist, had this to say about what John would do, Luke 1:77, "To give knowledge of salvation unto His people by the remission of their sins." Jesus said, Matthew 18:11, ''For the Son of Man is come to save that which was lost." Matthew 9:13b, "For I am not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.'' Luke 5:31b, "They that are whole need not a physician; but they that are sick." We have a number of examples of Jesus saving sinners or bad people. In Luke 7:37, ''A woman in the city which was a sinner." The woman of Samaria at Jacob's well; the thief on the cross were among those whom Jesus saved. In the book of Acts we have the example of the crucifiers of Jesus, the Philippian jailor; Saul of Tarsus. Everything said about Jesus dying for the ungodly, for the sinner, or putting away sins by the sacrifice of Himself, teaches that Jesus saves sinners, and not good folk. To attempt to prove Jesus saves sinners and not good folk, is like attempting to prove that it is light in the day time and not dark.

This we must keep clear, Jesus does not save all bad people, He does not save all sinners. He did not while He was here, He does not now. There is and was this difference between the sinners Jesus saves and the sinners He does not save. Those that come to faith in Him as Saviour get interested in Him and learn of Him. There were the two thieves on the crosses beside Jesus, they were equal sinners, one got interested in Jesus, and believed in Him and was saved; the other did not. Here is the sinners' responsibility. Here is our privilege and opportunity.

Look this proposition straight in the face: God does not save good folk. However, sinners, in order to be saved, must stand before God righteous, or must be good before God. If this strikes you as being contradictory and foolish, recall that God said through Isaiah 55:8-9, ''For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher

than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts." The Holy Spirit through Paul in I Corinthians 1:23-24, makes this distinguishing statement, "But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumbling block, and unto the Greeks foolishness; But unto them which are saved, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God."

God saves human beings, all mankind has sinned. All men have sinned and come short of the glory of God. None good, no not one. Therefore, for a sinner to be saved, his sins must be put away, and he must have goodness put to his credit. God sent His only begotten Son into the world to be our Saviour, to be the Saviour of sinners. God, through this all-glorious One, makes every provision to save sinners. Every bloody sacrifice in the Old Testament was saying that this coming One was a sin-bearer. John the Baptist said as he looked upon Jesus, John 1:29b, "Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world." Hebrews 9:26b-28 the Holy Spirit gives this testimony, "But now once in the end of the world hath He appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. And as it is appointed unto men, once to die, but after this the judgment: So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for Him shall He appear the second time without sin unto salvation.'' Peter writing as the Holy Spirit moved him said, I Peter 2:24, "Who His own self bare our sins in His own body on the tree, that we being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed.''

Now a word of testimony as the Holy Spirit reveals it through Paul. Galatians 3:13 "Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, cursed is everyone that hangeth on a tree."

The saved person must not only be without sin, he must have goodness before God. This goodness or righteousness God provides. He imputes it to the believer. Here is His testimony, Romans 4:5, "But to him that worketh not, but believeth on Him that justifieth the ungodly, his

faith is counted for righteousness.'' In Romans 5:17 it is said that this righteousness is a gift. ''For if by one man's offense death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ."