What it means to be ‘saved’

'The first thing we should do before we talk to others about Jesus is to pray for them'

The post What it means to be ‘saved’ appeared first on WorldNetDaily.

The word “saved” has fallen out of fashion a bit. We don’t see it as much as we used to, but it’s the perfect word to accurately describe what it means to be a Christian. It’s a dramatic word, one that we see in the news when a firefighter runs into a burning building and rescues someone or when a lifeguard comes to the aid of a struggling swimmer.

There was a time when Christians would ask the people they knew this question: Are you saved?

According to the Bible, you are either saved or lost. You are either born again or spiritually dead. The Bible tells us that God has saved us. And “save” is exactly what Jesus does.

In Romans 10, the apostle Paul tells us how we are saved and that we should care enough so that others can be saved as well. We also need to realize that if we want to see people saved, it starts with prayer. When we think of sharing our faith, we usually focus on how we should start the conversation. But really, the first thing we should do before we talk to others about Jesus is to pray for them.

What kind of prayer do we pray? We ask God to open their spiritual eyes and soften their hearts. We pray they would be receptive to the message we are about to bring. Prayer is the work, and then God works.

That is what Paul was saying in Romans 10 when he wrote, “Dear brothers and sisters, the longing of my heart and my prayer to God is for the people of Israel to be saved” (Romans 10:1 NLT).

Matthew’s gospel tells us, “When he [Jesus] saw the crowds, he had compassion on them because they were confused and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. He said to his disciples, ‘The harvest is great, but the workers are few. So pray to the Lord who is in charge of the harvest; ask him to send more workers into his fields'” (9:36–38 NLT).

When Jesus looked at the multitudes, he saw them as confused and helpless. Far too often, we see nonbelievers as the enemy. But nonbelievers are not the enemy. The Bible tells us, “Satan, who is the god of this world, has blinded the minds of those who don’t believe. They are unable to see the glorious light of the Good News. They don’t understand this message about the glory of Christ, who is the exact likeness of God” (2 Corinthians 4:4 NLT).

For example, God called Jonah to preach to the people of Nineveh, which was the capital of Assyria. The Ninevites were the avowed enemies of the Jewish people, much like Iran today.

Typically, Hebrew prophets only preached to Hebrew people. We don’t have many instances in the Bible to speak of, apart from Jonah, in which God called a Hebrew prophet to go to a distant land and tell the people to repent. But that is exactly what God told Jonah to do. However, Jonah didn’t want to go.

It wasn’t that Jonah was afraid he would fail. Actually, he was afraid he would succeed. He didn’t want these people to believe. It was his hope that God would eradicate the Ninevites and the nation Assyria from the face of the earth. It would have been one less enemy Israel had to deal with.

Jonah didn’t want to go because he knew the nature of God. In fact, when he finally preached to them, they repented of their sin. As a result, Jonah was a little angry about it.

The Bible says that Jonah complained to God and said, “Didn’t I say before I left home that you would do this, Lord? That is why I ran away to Tarshish! I knew that you are a merciful and compassionate God, slow to get angry and filled with unfailing love. You are eager to turn back from destroying people. Just kill me now, Lord! I’d rather be dead than alive if what I predicted will not happen” (Jonah 4:2–3 NLT).

Let’s not have the same heart that Jonah had toward nonbelievers. Let’s be thankful that God forgives. The God of the Old Testament is the same as the God of the New Testament, and he is full of love, compassion and mercy. He wants to forgive, and he takes no delight in judging people.

Jesus said, “But I say, love your enemies! Pray for those who persecute you! In that way, you will be acting as true children of your Father in heaven. For he gives his sunlight to both the evil and the good, and he sends rain on the just and the unjust alike” (Matthew 5:44–45 NLT).

When we want to see people saved, we will face obstacles. If we start praying for them and engaging them in conversation, we will face opposition. Again in Romans 10, the apostle Paul wrote, “I know what enthusiasm they have for God, but it is misdirected zeal. For they don’t understand God’s way of making people right with himself. Refusing to accept God’s way, they cling to their own way of getting right with God by trying to keep the law” (verses 2–3 NLT).

God had given the law to the Jewish people, but the law never was meant to save them. It was to show them they needed a Savior. And there’s only one individual to ever walk this earth who kept all of the law without failure: Jesus Christ.

The law pointed to the answer. Everything in the Old Testament – the animal sacrifices, the feasts and the high priest – were symbols and shadows of the fulfillment that would come through Jesus Christ. The law was the shadow of things to come.

Thus, Paul was saying they didn’t understand God’s way of getting right with him.

According to Scripture, we are headed either to Heaven or Hell. Therefore, we want to make sure that we’re saved, and we want to do everything we can to help our neighbors, our family, our friends, and others we know to be saved as well.

There’s only one way to be saved. Romans 10:9 says, “If you openly declare that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved” (NLT).

The Gospel, by design, is not to be hoarded. Rather, it’s to be shared. And as we share this life-giving message with others, it also is a life-giving message to us.

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