The Call to Action

Praise the Lord.

I haven't heard that song in a long time.

And the Lord is my witness, I was just out in my yard the other

day and the song came to my mind.

I hadn't heard it in forever.

And I was thinking to myself even then, just a couple days ago,

what a good song that would be for one of our Wednesday nights.

So thank you, Mrs.

Peters.

That was an awesome song.

Love that song.

The truth of it is, it hits home.

All right, we are on Section 6, and we're going to jump right

into it tonight.

Now, if you want to grab that one piece of paper, the simple outline

of the plan of salvation, someone asked me today, did I have

the whole thing on there?

And that is only meant to be one page right there.

And it is just a simple outline of the plan of salvation.

I just put that on there so that you would have reference to

the primary verses that I use when I'm witnessing to someone.

And of course, there's a lot of others.

That's why you have the notebook in front of you.

But these are the primary verses.

And at least it used to be.

Now incorporated.

And as you go about doing this yourself, you'll find your own voice,

you'll find your own verses, you'll find your own illustrations

to use along the way.

And so, once again, I certainly don't think I have a market

on how to do this.

I'm sure I can learn from many of you in here, but we're looking

at the soul winner's message.

That's section six.

If you have your outline, it's page 36.

And there are.

I'm not.

I'm just going to review real quickly.

There are three basic components that we were talking about

that needed to successfully.

That we need to successfully convey a thorough salvation message.

That was those three stops on the road to heaven.

The why do I need to be saved?

Who can save me?

And how am I saved?

And as we said, as we consider that particular.

Those particular questions, it's imperative that we first consider

the role of the law in evangelism.

For years, I didn't use the law.

And then when it was introduced to me, I saw how biblical

it was to use the law.

And it works.

And so I've been using it ever since.

We made a couple of statements.

We said regarding the law, that is the Ten Commandments, the

laws of God.

We said, number one, the law magnifies.

It makes sin more obvious.

Number two, the law intensifies.

It increases the degree of conviction.

We said, number three, the Law clarifies.

It makes clear the nature of salvation needed.

And then we jumped over to page 39.

There were a couple of things that I mentioned.

I said list.

I said, jesus used this key because the law is.

It's the key that opens the door of conviction to the heart.

The Bible tells us that Romans 3:20 by the law is the knowledge

Romans 3:20

of sin.

And if we use the law as we're witnessing, then it will bring conviction.

It's the key that opens the door and it brings conviction to

the heart.

I don't have to try to condemn them.

I don't want anyone to ever feel like I'm condemning them or

judging them when I'm talking to them about Christ.

I don't ever want that to happen.

God's a whole lot better at doing it than I am.

I'll only make them mad, and I don't want that to happen.

So using the law in a very discerning way.

Be wise as serpents, harmless as doves.

Using the law, being gentle but forthright, and God will do the

rest.

Amen.

Jesus used the key.

John used this key.

Paul used this key, James used this key.

And then we began to look at those questions with the view of

the law in mind.

We said number one at page 39, why do I need to be saved?

That was the first of those three questions.

Why do I need to be saved?

We said letter A.

Because of our sin.

Because of our sin.

I majored on that last week.

Because it's important that while we're witnessing to people,

we don't soft soap it.

We don't soft soap it.

People need to know that they're sinners, but more than that,

that they've sinned against a holy God, that they have offended

a God by breaking his laws.

And then we, in fact, we talked about the fact that all mankind

were sinners.

Then we said letter B on page 40, because our sin is against God.

All have sinned and come short of the glory of God.

And then this is where we bring the Ten Commandments into it.

We show them that the law, the Ten Commandments, is God's standard

for righteousness.

If you.

I forgot to bring the.

I forgot to put out the tracts out there today and the bookmarks,

the Ten Commandment bookmarks.

But I've got them.

I'll put them out there next week or you can hit me up for them.

I'll be more than happy to grab them and give you some.

But the Ten Commandments, the law of God is.

That's God's.

Standard for righteousness.

You remember what Jesus said, Except your righteousness exceed

the righteousness of the scribes and the Pharisees, you cannot

enter into heaven.

Well, exceed it.

I mean, good night.

And then he went on to commend how they kept the law, I mean, to

the nth degree, how they tithe on everything.

And then he said, unless you're.

And these guys are like, I can't do that.

And what Jesus was trying to get them to see was that our righteousness,

in order to get to heaven, our righteousness must exceed that.

And the way to do that is to keep the law.

That's the only way to do that.

And we can't do that.

And it won't take long.

Going over those ten commandments, I always start with

the ninth one.

I always start with the one that's going to hit them right, right

between the eyes.

Always.

Have you ever told a lie?

And everybody, everybody will always say, I get one out of 10,000

will say, no, I've never lied.

Seriously, they're out there, they will say that.

But for the most part, everyone's going to admit that.

And then.

What's the next question?

I'll tell you what's the next question.

The next question is, well, how many lies do you have to tell

to be a liar?

Or actually, I won't even go that way because that can be offensive.

I actually say, well, how many lies do I have to tell to be a liar?

And they will just say, just one.

How many cars do I have to steal to be a car thief?

Just one.

So you see, it's the word of God.

The law itself is what's going to get them to understand that they

can't meet God's righteousness for heaven.

In order to get to heaven, we must be perfect.

And so in order to help them to understand that, of course we

show them your sin has separated you from God and that sin

is transgression of the law.

Pastor did a marvelous job last week at the end of the service

breaking that down into one simplified commandment that Jesus

brought it down to.

And that is love God, love yourself, or love your neighbor as

yourself.

And the bottom line is selfishness.

It's self centeredness.

We don't love anybody else.

I like what you said when we ask somebody.

Remember I told you I said, anybody will say, well, yeah, I stole

when I was a kid.

And we say, well, okay, well, stealing that pencil, stealing the

pencil is not what's going to send you to hell.

It's treating that Store owner.

You didn't treat that store owner like you wanted to be treated

selfishness.

And so he broke it down into a tremendous New Testament command.

But you can use any of these.

And I always go to the Ten Commandments, James 2:10 is a great

James 2:10

one.

I have that on page 41.

James 2:10.

James 2:10

Whosoever shall keep the whole law and yet offend in one one point,

he's guilty of all.

But I promise you, if you go through these, you're going to find

they'll be breaking more than one.

I can usually get through four or five, and then I just stop right

there.

And usually I'll look at them and I'll say, look, we've only gone

through four of these and you're already swinging 100.

You're batting a thousand.

I've only gone over four, and they've already admitted to breaking

all four.

And then I will repeat that verse.

You can keep the whole law and yet offend in one.

You're guilty of all.

And so then I asked them, if you died today and you had to stand

before God and He judged you according to his law, would you be

innocent or guilty?

I'm telling you the question.

The answer is always, always, will I be guilty?

Now, whether they say it with compunction is a different story,

but at least they'll admit it.

Alright, and that takes us to verse, to number, page 42.

And so we're looking at why do we need to be saved?

We said, first of all, because of our sin.

Secondly, we said letter D because there is a penalty for breaking

God's law.

The penalty, number one under that is death.

The penalty is death.

Genesis 2, 16, 17.

The Lord God commanded the man, saying, of every tree of the

garden, thou mayest freely eat.

But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou

shalt not eat of it.

For in the day that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely

die.

Now, the New Testament counterpart to that verse to Genesis

2 is Romans 6:23.

Romans 6:23

The wages of sin is death.

Okay, that's the New Testament counterpart to Genesis.

Now, we understand, and it's helpful to explain this to them in

brief.

You don't have to go give them a full academic lecture.

You don't have to go give them an exegesis of Genesis.

But if you'll just give them a brief understanding of the fact that

when they partook of the fruit, they didn't physically die,

they didn't drop dead.

I mean, you can ask them that, well, did Adam and Eve drop dead?

The moment they ate the fruit.

And even if they'd never been to church, they know enough to say,

well, no, but the death process began.

It began in them.

The physical death process began.

But what did actually happen?

Instantaneous.

As soon as they ate that fruit, the penalty of spiritual death

was instantaneous.

Their spirit died.

Their ability to communicate with God, or God's ability to communicate

with them through their spirit was gone.

And so, of course, they were excommunicated from the garden.

But look, I'm putting in this notebook for you.

More than what you need to give them, most of this is for you.

There's an understanding here that will help you to break it down

into a simplified manner.

But if you'll understand these truths, you can give it to them in

a simple way, and it'll help you to really have more conviction

when you're explaining it, when you're giving it to them.

I always use, even though I only carry my New Testament, when

I'm knocking doors or soul winning, I always refer to Ezekiel

18, even though I can't show it to them, but I have it memorized.

Ezekiel 18:4 says, Behold, all souls are mine is the soul of the

Ezekiel 18:4

Father, so also the soul of the Son is mine.

The soul that sinneth, it shall die.

The soul that sinneth, it shall die.

And then I take them to Hebrews 9:27.

Hebrews 9:27

I have that in your outline on page 43.

And by the way, you ought to highlight Romans 6:23 and Hebrews

Romans 6:23 Hebrews 9:27

9:27.

These are ones that you should use as it is appointed unto men once

to die.

But after this, the judgment.

Folks, I want to tell you something.

That particular verse right there is a very powerful verse to

use at this juncture in your soul winning conversation.

Because once I tell them that they're sinners, once they've said,

yeah, I'm a sinner, I agree, man, I'm guilty before God.

I've broken his laws.

Wow.

The penalty is death.

Yes, but let me ask you something.

Let me show you this verse as it is appointed unto man once to

die, but after this, the judgment.

Now, I think I've shared this with you before, but I'll share it

again.

I can't tell you how many times.

Thousands, literally, literally thousands of times I've

showed this verse and I've asked them, I said, now, when a person

dies, and if they're put in the grave, what happens to their

body after, oh, 10 years or so, however many years it takes.

And most every single one of them will say, well, it decomposes

or it goes back to dust or whatever, goes to the earth, it's

eaten by worms.

They'll say, whatever.

And then I say, okay, well, if that's true, then what goes to judgment?

I'm telling you with my hand before the Lord.

I have never, ever, ever had anybody ever say anything other than,

well, my soul or my spirit.

I'm telling you, they know it.

They may never go to church.

They may have never read that verse before.

They may have never read the Bible, but it's in them.

They know they are an eternal being.

And they just know that when this thing is all over, you ask them

that question.

Well, if you die and your body decompose, than what goes to judgment?

I'm telling you, thousands of.

I can't even.

I don't even know how many times.

Every single time, without fail, they will say, well, my soul

or my spirit, brother, you got them.

And I don't mean you got them.

The Lord's got them.

But you know what I'm saying, it's going in the right direction

because you want that conviction in their heart.

You want them to understand, man, I got to stand before God.

I'm going to be judged before God.

My body's going to be gone.

This body is just the.

It's just the vehicle of the soul.

And every soul that sinneth, it shall die.

And so then I have this in sequence here for a reason.

Revelation 20.

I always take them to Revelation 20 next.

Look at it with me there.

I won't spend a lot of time here, but look at verse 13.

But I do with them.

I go through it from verse 12 on, I talk about, this is the great

white throne judgment.

This is when everybody stands, and it says right there, I saw the

dead, small and great, stand before God.

But then, look in verse 13.

The sea gave up the dead which were in it.

Death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them.

And they were judged, every man, according to their works.

And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire.

This is the second death.

I always stop right there.

Every single time, I'll stop and I'll say, did you know that there

were two deaths?

And I'm telling you, if folks are not saved, they're going to say,

no, I didn't know there were two deaths.

And then I began to show them.

Whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast

into the lake of fire.

Death and hell were cast into the lake of fire.

This is the second death.

So, yes, when you die Your body decomposes, your soul goes to

judgment.

You stand before God and without Jesus Christ you will spend

an eternity in a lake of fire.

That is the second death.

And that's sobering, folks.

Now I put on page 44, I'm not going to go through this.

I'll give you the blanks, of course, but I'm not going to read

every verse.

This is for your benefit because I think it's important that

we have an understanding of what hell is like.

It's good for us to know, Paul said, knowing therefore the terror

of the Lord, we persuade men.

It's good for us to have an idea of what hell is, even if they

won't.

I mean, it's the word of God, you can read it to them, but they

still don't have the spirit of God in them and they're not really

going to understand it like you do.

And so, but just look at what is hell like.

And I've used Luke 16, the rich man and Lazarus.

I've used that passage there to give you an understanding of what

it is like, at least to a degree.

So in Luke 16, verse 19 through 28, look at a letter A, one

Luke 16:19–28

can see what is hell like.

You can see in hell.

He lifted up his eyes.

Letter B, one can physically feel being in torments, Being in

torments.

Letter C, one can speak.

He cried and said, father Abraham, have mercy on me.

Letter D, one can remember.

But Abraham said, son, remember that thou in thy lifetime.

You know, it's a sad day.

And if you want to incorporate this into your soul winning conversation,

you can, you can show them this.

Look, the Bible says that if we die without Jesus Christ, we will

spend an eternity remembering.

Every time somebody brought the gospel to my door, I will spend

an eternity remembering how many times I said, no thank you,

I don't need that.

I got this.

It's not a bad thing if you want to bring this up.

People get saved for all different reasons.

Some get saved because they are afraid of hell.

The Lord began to draw me to himself and he used a life that was

just empty to do it.

I was making good money, but at the same time, you know, you've

heard my story.

Drugs, alcohol and just the lifestyle that I was living.

But you know, there came a certain time and even as a young

man, I'd been doing it for quite a while.

But even as a young man at 20 years old, even at that point I came

to a place where I said, there's gotta be more to life than

this man.

I'M tired of this.

I get paid on Friday, do what I do on the weekend, and by Monday,

I'm broke already.

Where is it at and what's my life?

And so the Lord used that to help me to see there's more to life.

But then it was the accident, the totaling, the company truck.

When I looked at that truck and I realized, man, if I'd have

died in that, I'd have gone to hell.

And that sobered me up enough to really want to mean business with

God at that point.

So God uses all different things to lead people to Himself.

One can speak, one can remember letter E.

One can desire.

Then he said, I pray thee therefore, Father, that thou wouldest

send him.

There'll be an eternity of regret.

An eternity of regret.

Maybe you want to share that with them.

Look, you can remember every time that you heard the gospel, every

time you laughed at church, every time you fell asleep, every

time you scrolled on your phone instead of listening to the

message, every time you looked at Facebook, instead of every time

you laughed at the preaching.

And not only will you be able to remember it, you're going to regret

it.

You'll regret it for eternity.

And then letter F, if you want to use this one.

For those who believe that they're going to rule in hell with

Satan, hell is the final prison for Satan and his followers.

Revelation 20:10 says, and the devil that deceived them was cast

Revelation 20:10

into the lake of fire.

And you might want to emphasize that word deceived the

devil that deceived them.

He's a master liar.

He is a liar.

He's the father of lies.

His job description is, deceive, deceive the devil that deceived

and was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast

and the false prophet are and shall be tormented day and night

forever, ever.

So that's there for you if you want to incorporate it.

I don't normally incorporate that into it, but it's there and

I know it's there, and so I use it if the Lord so leads.

But the fact of the matter is we will be challenged about the reality

of hell.

And obviously we haven't been there.

This is all in your outline.

We haven't been there, so we can't speak to its reality.

But we trust in the word of God.

We have faith in the Bible and trust that the Bible will bring conviction

to their heart.

I can't explain it because I've never been there.

All I can do is share what the Bible says by the way can I say this

to you?

No one else has ever been there and back.

And you've seen those.

You've seen those.

You've seen stories or heard people say or however, wherever,

whoever they say they've been to hell and back, brother, sister,

anybody who's ever been to hell and back, they're going to one

or two things going to happen.

They're either going to be a raving lunatic, seriously, because

they're not going to be able to look into the portals of hell

and come out of there sane, or they're going to be the world's greatest

evangelist.

How can you see that and not tell the world how real it is?

So, all right, I'm going to move on because I'm going to try

to make some headway tonight.

45.

Let's go to page 46.

At the top of the page, I just want you to understand.

Are you convinced that there is a hell?

Are you convinced it is a place where those who reject Christ

will spend eternity in torment?

And so the Bible describes the fate of the lost.

And I've written several verses down there for you.

Daniel says, shame and everlasting.

Matthew 24 calls it weeping and gnashing of teeth, Matthew 25,

everlasting punishment, and so on and so forth.

And I have a lot of verses there for you to read.

And so it's important that we don't gloss over that.

Listen, God is serious about judgment.

God is serious about the judgment of sin.

Our God is a perfect God.

His love is perfect.

His grace is perfect.

His mercy is perfect.

His forgiveness is perfect.

But we must also understand, we must help others to understand

who are going to major on.

Well, God is love.

God is love.

He loves me and he's forgiving.

Yes, well, he's also perfect in his justice.

He's perfect in his holiness.

He's perfect in his righteousness.

And as a judge, he must judge perfectly.

If he closed a blind eye, if he turned a blind eye to breaking

his laws, he wouldn't be a good judge.

And we think we talked about that last week.

A good judge will judge righteously.

All right, let's move on then.

So question number one is, why do I need to be saved?

Number two is this.

Who can save me?

Who can save me?

So there's obviously the answer that you and I know.

Only.

Only.

Only the Lord Jesus Christ can save us from God's judgment.

Only.

That's letter A.

I'll just put a plug in for I have one.

I think I put a.

I Think I put a piece of paper out there that says how to witness

to a Hindu.

And I shared that.

And I'll just tell you that if you pick that up, I think it's back

there.

If you pick it up, it's not in depth, it doesn't tell you what verses

to use, how to approach it, how to explain it, it doesn't tell

you that, it just gives you some ideas on how they're thinking.

And I only brought that one because in this area we have a lot

of Hindus moving in a lot.

And so if you want to grab that, I don't know how many copies

are back there, but if you want to grab it, it'll kind of give

you an idea of what, how they think religiously.

And a lot of times, you know, it's not like you think they think.

And so it'd be worth picking up and just reading through.

So only the Lord Jesus Christ can save us from God's judgment.

John 3:16.

John 3:16

Of course.

John 3:36.

John 3:36

John 5:24.

John 5:24

Verily I say unto you, he that heareth my word and believeth on

him that sent me hath everlasting life.

Look, you can lead someone to Christ with these three verses, right?

These three passages.

John 3:16, you can take.

John 3:16

That's the Gospel in miniature right there.

John 3:16.

John 3:16

For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son.

See, you can stop right there and say he gave them for what?

You could explain that.

Why did he give His Son?

Because we're all sinners.

Because we've sinned against God.

Alright?

That whosoever believeth in him, Believeth what?

That he died for your sins and that he resurrected.

See, you can take John 3:16 and literally use that verse alone

John 3:16

to explain the gospel.

But we have more, thankfully.

We have a whole bunch of gospel verses that we can use.

Verse 36 he that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life.

By the way, I want you to notice this in these verses.

It doesn't say, it doesn't say anything about baptism, does it?

It says he that believeth, he that believeth on the Son.

Verse 36 Hath everlasting life.

And he that believeth not shall not see life.

But the wrath of God abideth on him.

The wrath of God abideth on him.

John 5:24 he that heareth my word and believeth on him that sent

John 5:24

me hath everlasting life, and shall not come into what condemnation

it's worth showing them these verses and pointing out certain words,

condemnation.

Jesus said, I am the way.

John 14:6.

John 14:6

I am the way, the truth, the life.

He didn't say a way.

Right.

So these are verses that you can use in a real powerful way.

I mean, just use them.

He is the not a way, not one way.

Acts, chapter four.

Neither is there salvation in any other, for there's none other

name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved.

Now, why is Jesus the only way of salvation?

Now I will say this.

What I'm going to show you right here is really, it's for you.

If you need to incorporate it into your gospel presentation, you

can, and it's certainly not going to hurt.

I'm definitely for truth.

And I don't think that ignorance is not bliss.

And I don't think that there's any holy virtue in being ignorant.

But I also, again, want to be careful that we don't overload somebody

with stuff that they don't necessarily need to know right now

and they will learn later if they get saved.

And this is probably one of those things.

And I only say that.

And we may differ, Pastor, may differ.

I may differ from a lot of different, a lot of preachers and

maybe because how we were brought up, but I was so ignorant,

you know, I was so ignorant of the Bible and spiritual things when

I got saved, I didn't know hardly anything.

I did not know what I'm going to share with you here.

But now that I know it, it helps me to be prepared to share

it with others if I need to.

Why is Jesus the only way of salvation?

Because it was a man, Adam, our human head, who cast all of mankind

into sinking, I mean into sin by breaking God's law.

And you can share.

And I have used some of these.

Romans 5:12.

Romans 5:12

As by one man sin entered into the world.

And I've done that.

I've said, now which man do you think that was?

As by one man sin entered into the world.

And sometimes they will have the right answer, and especially

if they're already religious, if they're already going to church

somewhere, you can absolutely use some of these.

But if they don't have any kind of idea about church at all,

this is kind of lost on them.

Romans 5:18.

Romans 5:18

Therefore, as by the offense of one judgment came upon all men

to condemnation.

Even so, by the righteousness of 1.

For at verse 19.

For as by 1 man's disobedience, many were made sinners.

So you know, it's not your fault, it's Adam's fault.

That You're a sinner.

You were born that way.

You don't become a sinner by sinning.

You sin because you're a sinner.

Does that make sense?

And that's what I asked them along the way.

By the way, folks, let me do.

Let me stop.

And I want to emphasize that along the way, I will always, many

times I will stop and say, does that make sense?

Do you understand this?

Because if they don't go back, we're not looking for a feather in

our hat, are we?

We're not looking for a notch on our belt.

We're looking for understanding.

And given the Holy Spirit an opportunity to work in their heart

through understanding the word of God.

So number two under there, if it must therefore be a man, because

it was a man, Adam, our human head representative, who cast all

of mankind into sin by breaking God's law.

Number two, it must therefore be a man who keeps God's law perfectly

in order to stand before God on man's behalf.

Okay?

And Jesus is that man.

Letter C, write this in there.

He is the God man.

And it's okay to say that.

It's okay to say that to them.

They probably never heard that before.

They may have heard God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy

Spirit, but I doubt they've ever heard anybody call him the God

man.

But the fact is, he is the virgin born, sinless Son of God and

God the Son, who came into the world as a man for this very purpose.

Page 49.

I have a bunch of verses there for you that you can use to emphasize

the fact that Jesus is God.

And I like verse 10 of John 1, verse 10.

John 1:10

He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world

knew him not.

I mean, boy, you've got so much here.

He came unto his own, and his own received him not.

But to as many as received him, to them gave he the power to

become the sons of God to as many as received him.

We're going to get down to this.

When we come to.

How do I get saved?

By receiving Jesus Christ.

By receiving Jesus Christ.

I'm so glad.

I'm really, really so glad that Buddy Howard, that day, April

18th.

Actually, I guess it was.

Yeah, April 18th, 1984.

When I came down to that altar and he took me into another room.

He knelt down with me and Buddy Howard said, james, why are

you here?

I said, well, I just.

I'm not saved.

And I know I need to be saved accordingly.

I only knew what David had told me hours before.

What Salvation was what getting saved was.

And I said, I want that.

So I said, I need to get saved.

I'm so glad Buddy Howard didn't say to me, okay, well, you

need to ask Jesus into your heart then.

I'm glad he didn't say that.

I'm so glad he didn't say.

Now repeat this prayer after me.

He didn't do that.

He didn't do that.

You know what he did?

He introduced me to Jesus.

He said, do you believe that you are a sinner?

I had no problem with that.

Yes, sir.

He said, do you believe that Jesus Christ died on the cross for

your sin?

Yes, sir.

And then he said something that is left out of so many gospel

presentations.

Do you believe, James, that he rose from the grave?

Do you know how essential that is to our gospel presentation?

I said, yes, sir.

And I was so ignorant, I didn't really know much about it,

but I believed that he did it.

And I said, well, isn't that what Easter is all about?

That's what I said.

He said, yes, it is.

He said, james, if you want to get saved now, you're just going

to have to ask God to forgive you and receive Jesus Christ as your

Savior.

And I did.

And it took.

Amen.

It took.

Phew.

And so to as many as received him.

I emphasize that so much.

I'm not opposed to people praying a prayer.

I have helped people.

I've actually had people say to me, will you help me pray?

I've actually had people, what am I going to tell them?

No, no, you got to do it yourself.

No, I will help them if they ask me to, I will.

And.

But I'll do it like this.

I'll kind of say something like.

I will say something like, jerry, I'm going to pray.

Kind of like I prayed back April 18, 1984.

But it wasn't that prayer that saved me.

It was me believing what I was saying.

What saved me was my faith in Jesus.

But I prayed kind of like this, and I think it's important.

I got saved.

I believe in the truck that day, in the van that day when we

were going around Luke 6:10, and he shared with me what it meant

Luke 6:10

to be saved.

And I said, man, I want that.

I need that.

I truly believe with all my heart that I got saved that moment

in the van about 8:15 in the morning, going around Luke 6:10.

Luke 6:10

I went to the church that night and I prayed that little prayer.

And that kind of put it in concrete in my heart.

It kind of solidified it for Me, but looking back in retrospect,

I got saved in the van, but I needed that time.

I needed that time.

And I'm not opposed to anybody walking an aisle and coming down

and praying a prayer.

I'm not opposed to that at all.

But it's not a prayer that saves, is it?

It is a person.

It is receiving Jesus Christ.

He is that God man.

And then you can take him through John 1, and you can take

him through Galatians, chapter 4.

Galatians 4 · chapter mention

When the fullness of time was come, God sent forth his Son, made

of a woman, made under the law to redeem them that were under the

law.

I want to tell you one of my favorite verses.

Look at the next page, page 50.

He came to pay a debt that mankind owed for breaking his law.

And of course, I will simplify it as I.

And what I'm going to try to do is I'm going to try to do a role

play for you when we.

To show you how actually simple I take it, without making

it overly simple.

But I will take Romans 6:23.

Romans 6:23

For the wages of sin is death.

And I will use that word, wage.

What is a wage?

It's a payment for what you do.

When you work eight hours a day, you work 40 hours a week, you

get a wage, you get paid.

Well, the Bible says here, the wages of sin.

What you do when you sin, you're earning something, you're

earning a penalty, and that penalty is death.

The wages of sin is death.

And so obviously I say now that's bad news for the wages of

sin.

I mean, look, Jerry, up to this point, all we've ever done is

talked about what a terrible sinner you are, how that you've broken

God's law, you've offended him, you're on your way to hell.

Would you say that's good news?

And folks, I talk to them like this and they will say, no, I'll

say, you're right.

That's all bad news.

But you know what?

It's bad news that makes good news good.

Without the bad news.

You have no idea that there's actually any good news.

The fact of the matter is In Romans, chapter 6, verse 23, the

Romans 6:23

Bible says the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal

life through Jesus Christ.

Now taking Romans 5, 8, God commended.

He demonstrated his love toward us in that while we were yet

sinners, we've been majoring on sin.

They already have a conviction that they're sinful, that they've

offended God.

The wages of sin is death.

But God.

Romans 5:12.

Romans 5:12

Is that right?

5:8.

I already 5:8.

But God commended his love toward us.

He demonstrated his love towards in that while we were yet

sinners, Christ died for us.

He paid that debt.

Number two at the top of your page 50.

He paid the debt that mankind owed for breaking his law.

And now I was trying to look for that verse.

Where is that verse?

Well, let's go to letter D.

I'm going to get to it.

Okay, so because Jesus, the son of God, God the Son, died to

satisfy the debt God commanded.

Okay, we were talking about who can save me?

Only Jesus.

Why?

Because he is the God man.

He's the only way of salvation.

He's the God man.

And because he is the one who died to satisfy the debt that God

demanded.

And do I have blanks in those verses there?

Matthew 27.

Are there blanks there or is it just underlined?

Okay, great.

I'm not going to go through them.

Let's go on so you can.

So Jesus satisfies the debt.

Everybody understands debt.

Everybody understands debt.

One of my favorite things to do One of my favorite things to do

when I'm talking to somebody and I get to this point, the wages

of sin is death.

But the gift of God is eternal life.

And Jesus paid.

The wages of sin is death.

I like to go to, I ask them, I say, do you have a car?

And most everybody will say, yeah, I have a car.

And most everybody still owes on the car.

Most everybody.

So I'll ask my what do you still owe on your vehicle?

Yeah.

I said, what would you think if I took the exact amount that you

owed and I went down to the bank and I paid that for you and

then told you, hey, I have a gift for you.

And that gift.

I just, I paid your car off and you don't owe me anything.

It's just a gift.

It's a gift and I don't want you to do anything for me.

It's just a gift.

And they're like, okay, well, yeah, that'd be awesome.

I said, now what would they say if you called down to the bank

or if you went to the bank the next day and you said, here, I'm

here to make a payment.

What would they say?

It's already paid.

I use that illustration.

It's, it's, it works.

And you can come up with your own.

But debt.

And somebody paid that debt.

And especially the more they owe, the greater the satisfaction,

the greater the appreciation.

One of the things that I will use is I'll Talk about somebody committing

a heinous crime.

I'll say, let's say that you.

I'll say, jerry, I'm using Jerry today.

So let's say, Jerry, Jerry, let's say that you committed a heinous

crime.

I mean, it was horrible.

All the guilt.

You're guilty, you're in jail.

In fact, you're on death row.

You're on death row.

And then the judge actually comes up and says, look, Jerry, I

don't want you to die.

I'm gonna let my son die in your place and you're free.

Now, obviously it's not gonna happen, but if it could, Jerry, you're

free.

And so you get out and you go back to your home boys and they're

like, jerry, what are you doing here?

How'd you get out of jail, man?

You're on death rate.

You were scheduled to die.

How did you get out?

And then you said, well, you know what?

I was a model prisoner, man.

I was on the trustee system.

They just, everybody, I was just such a good prisoner.

They liked me a lot.

And they said they're going to give me a break.

They let me out.

And I look at Jerry as I'm talking to him and he knows that

that's not right.

And I look at him and I say, jerry, if you were to do that, that

would be the slap in God's face.

Because God sent his son to die in your place.

You were condemned to hell.

And for you to.

And for you to walk around and tell everybody, well, I'm going to

heaven because I'm such a good person.

I'm going to heaven because I go to church.

I'm going to heaven because I got baptized.

And you can come up with illustration after illustration and

every time.

Listen, I'm for illustrations.

Illustrations are windows that open up their windows that shed light

on your truth.

And every time that you.

I promise you, it's slapping him.

Especially if you get somebody who does say, well, I got baptized

or I go to church and they're self righteous in and of themselves,

you can use that illustration and help them to understand.

Or what?

Sometimes I would use the illustration, Jerry, I gave my son.

Or you gave what?

If you gave your son for me and I walked out and I told everybody,

how would you feel if I walked out and told everybody, well, I got

out because I was such a good prisoner.

How would that make you feel, Jerry, if you gave your son to die

in my place, right?

And so just turn.

It's a slap in God's face.

When we tell.

When we tell others that we got there on our own.

I was really hoping I could.

I was actually going to try to finish this tonight, but it's just

not going to happen.

But I'll give you these, I'm going to give you these blanks on

these next couple of pages and then we'll stop and on page 54 and

we'll be done next week for sure.

And I want to do some role play next, next week for just a few

minutes.

So on page 51, there's no, there are no blanks there.

You can read through that.

Please do, please do.

Because all of this is helpful when you're witnessing to someone.

Okay, here's one of my favorite verses on page 52.

The whole idea of a sacrifice is that an innocent would take the

place of the guilty.

First Peter 3:18.

1 Peter 3:18

I love to use this when I come down to this portion of the soul

winning presentation.

For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the

unjust, that he might bring us to God.

I kind of let that hang there.

The just for the unjust.

Jesus Christ, the innocent.

And then letter E.

Because Jesus Christ resurrected from the grave.

He resurrected from the grave.

I tell you, you can't leave that out.

I need to focus on that.

Maybe we'll pick up right there next week as well.

You can't leave that out.

I used to leave it out.

I used to skim right over it.

Or else just gloss over it real quickly and just wouldn't emphasize

it like it needs to be emphasized.

But look quickly.

Just look what he says in First Corinthians 15, verse 1.

1 Corinthians 15:1

Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel.

What is the gospel?

Verse 3.

How that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures.

How that he was buried and that he rose again the third day

according to the Scriptures.

Now look what he said.

I declare unto you the Gospel.

What did Paul say?

I am not ashamed of the what of the gospel.

Romans 1:16.

Romans 1:16

I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ, for what it is the power

of God unto salvation.

The gospel is the death, the burial, and the resurrection of Jesus

Christ.

You leave any of those out, you haven't given them the Gospel.

One final thought, and I'm going to shut it down here.

If there be no resurrection, he says in First Corinthians 15:13,

1 Corinthians 15:13

if there be no resurrection of the dead, then Christ is not risen.

If Christ be not risen.

And you can read those verses.

Look at the end of that paragraph right there on the bottom

of page 52.

I have actually spoken with people who claim to be born again,

but were hesitant to say that they believed the resurrection of

Jesus Christ.

I did not hesitate to tell them they were not saved.

You cannot be saved and not believe in the resurrection of Jesus

Christ.

Paul just said, if there be no resurrection, you're yet in your

sins.

Your faith is vain.

We must not leave out the resurrection.

It's so important that we preach the whole gospel to the lost

sinner if we want them to be saved.

Amen.

All right, we'll finish up there next week.

Let's pray together and then we'll have a verse of invitation.

Our Father, once again, we just come before you and we ask you

to print these truths indelibly upon our heart so that

when we are given the opportunity to share with others

people that you've dealt with, people who are ready to hear the

truth.

Lord, help us to be so convinced of this ourselves that

and so full of passion about it and compassion that people can't,

they can't turn away from this truth.

Of course, obviously we want you, the Holy Spirit to be working

in them.

But Lord, I pray that you would help us to not skim over sin

and the penalty of sin, hell and the lake of fire, and certainly

not the resurrection of Jesus Christ our Savior.

Lord, use this in our lives to make a difference in us and to help

others see the truth and to get saved.

We ask it in Jesus name.

Let's all stand together just for a moment or two with heads bowed,

just for a moment as the music plays and Brother Caleb sings through

a verse or two of invitation.

I want to give you an opportunity to come.

I really do.

I mean, look, maybe you're lost.

Maybe you never heard this.

Maybe you never got were under such conviction about sin before.

Never.

You really thought about it before.

Maybe you doubted the resurrection and now you need to

say, look, look, that's been a problem for me and I want to settle

that, whatever the need is.

And then again, those of us who are saved, maybe you just want

to make an altar out of your chair or come down here tonight and

say, I want to get in on this.

I want to lead people to Christ.

I want to be a soul winner.

You come tonight.

Be seated if you would, please.

I'll do a tagline, as I did last Wednesday night.

One of the things we know as Christians is we're to grow in the

knowledge of Jesus Christ.