an assignment from class...

So, I decided to post one of my assignments from class for review. Here it goes!

If an unsaved person asked you how to be saved, what would you say? Write some ideas about each subject on a separate sheet of paper. Write at least one Scripture reference beside each point in the outline. Practice sharing your outline with a family member of a friend. Ask God to give you opportunities to share His salvation with lost persons.

· Sin
· The cross
· Repentance
· God’s love
· Faith

• Sin - The one disease that plagues all humanity.
  Romans 5:12 – “When Adam sinned, sin entered the world. Adam’s sin brought death so death spread to everyone, for everyone sinned.
  Romans 3:23 – “For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard.”
  Romans 6:23 – “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord.”
• Sin requires a cure that could only be made by Jesus Christ.
  Leviticus 7:1-7 – Describe the requirement for the sin/guilt offering.
  Romans 3:25b – “For God presented Jesus as the sacrifice for sin. People are made right with God when they believe that Jesus sacrificed his life, shedding his blood.”
  Hebrews 9:11-28 – Outlines Christ’s sacrifice
  Hebrews 9:22 – “In fact, according to the law of Moses, nearly everything was purified with blood. For without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness.”
  Hebrews 9:27-28 – “And just as each person is destined to die once and after that comes judgment, so also Christ died once for all time as a sacrifice to take away the sins of many people. He will come again, not to deal with our sins, but to bring salvation to all who are eagerly waiting for him.”
• The Cross
  a. Where the payment was made for sin and humanity was given the opportunity to have fellowship with God through Jesus Christ
  Deuteronomy 21:22-23 – This passage tells us that anyone hung on a tree is cursed in the sight of God.
  Galatians 3:13 – “But Christ has rescued us from the curse pronounced by the law. When he was hung on the cross, he took upon himself the curse for our wrongdoing. For it is written in the Scriptures, “Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree”.”
  Colossians 1:19-22 – “For God in all his fullness was pleased to live in Christ and through him God reconciled everything to himself. He made peace with everything in heaven and on earth by means of Christ’s blood on the cross. This includes you who were once far away from God. You were his enemies, separated from him by your evil thoughts and actions. Yet now he has reconciled you to himself through the death of Christ in his physical body. As a result, he has brought you into his own presence, and you are holy and blameless as you stand before him without a single fault.”
• Repentance
  a. Is required of us. It is realizing that we don’t live up to God’s standards, turning away from our sin, confessing that we need a Savior and accepting Christ as Lord and Savior.
  Hosea 6:1-3 – “Come; let us return to the Lord. He has torn us to pieces; now he will heal us.He has injured us; now he will bandage our wounds. In just a short time he will restore us, so that we may live in his presence. Oh, that we might know the Lord! Let us press on to know him. He will respond to us as surely as the arrival of dawn or the coming of rains in early spring.”
  Hosea 14:1-2 – “Return, O Israel, to the Lord your God, for your sins have brought you down. Bring your confessions, and return to the Lord. Say to him, forgive all our sins and graciously receive us, so that we may offer you our praises.”
  Romans 10:9-10 – “If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is by believing in your heart that you are made right with God, and it is by confessing with your mouth that you are saved.”
• God’s Love
  a. Is evident through Jesus Christ.
  John 3:16 – “For God loved the world so much that he gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.”
  John 1:17 – “For the law was given through Moses, but God’s unfailing love and faithfulness came through Jesus Christ.”
  b. Gives us the opportunity to be his children.
  1 John 3:1 – “See how very much our Father loves us, for he calls us his children, and that is what we are! But the people who belong to this world don’t recognize that we are God’s children because they don’t know him.”
  Romans 8:15-17 – “So you have not received a spirit that makes you fearful slaves. Instead, you received God’s Spirit when he adopted you as his own children. Now we call him, “Abba, Father.” For his Spirit joins with our spirit to affirm that we are God’s children. And since we are his children, we are his heirs. In fact, together with Christ we are heirs of God’s glory. But if we are to share his glory, we must also share his suffering.”
• Faith
  a. Is required for belief.
  Romans 3:26b-28 – “God did this to demonstrate his righteousness, for he himself is fair and just, and he declares sinners to be right in his sight when they believe in Jesus. Can we boast, then, that we have done anything to be accepted by God? No, because our acquittal is not based on obeying the law. It is based on faith. 28 So we are made right with God through faith and not by obeying the law.
  Hebrews 11:1 – “Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen; it gives us assurance about things we cannot see.”

my next thirty years...

Have you ever felt out of the loop? Well, that is what I've noticed lately about my own life. I'm taking a Bible class and the things I'm studying I feel like I've just read for the first time in my life! Why is that? I accepted Christ as Lord and Savior when I was 10 years old. Though I've not always lived like a believer, I have read His word. Today, my 30th birthday by the way, I reread for the 2nd time this week Matthew 24:42-44.

• Matthew 24:42-44 (New Living Translation)
  “So you, too, must keep watch! For you don’t know what day your Lord is coming. Understand this: If a homeowner knew exactly when a burglar was coming, he would keep watch and not permit his house to be broken into. You also must be ready all the time, for the Son of Man will come when least expected.

What am I prepared for? What should I be prepared for? I'm learning how important it is to be prepared for eternity. I have realized how fearful I've been of sharing my faith with those who don't believe or who say they believe but have no fruit to show. What can man do to me that will affect my eternity...NOTHING! So what will my next thirty years look like...I am praying that they will look very different from the first thirty. My desire is to know Christ more and to make Him known!

• 1 Peter 3:15-17 (New Living Translation)
  "Instead, you must worship Christ as Lord of your life. And if someone asks about your Christian hope, always be ready to explain it. But do this in a gentle and respectful way. Keep your conscience clear. Then if people speak against you, they will be ashamed when they see what a good life you live because you belong to Christ. Remember, it is better to suffer for doing good, if that is what God wants, than to suffer for doing wrong!"

I want to live in such a way that my life reflects my relationship with Christ. That others can see a difference in my life and in the way I live when they look at me compared to society's standard. But not only me, my family. It is becoming more and more important to me that the lifestyle my family chooses reflects that of Christ. For me, He (Jesus Christ) must become greater and I must become less (John 3:30)!

when can a person be saved...

I believe that a person must acknowledge that they are sinful by nature, see their need for salvation, turn from their sin, accept and follow Christ wholeheartedly in order to be saved. Take these examples:



· A Good Man – Matthew 19:16-22; Here we find the rich, young ruler has approached Jesus and asked him, “What good deed must I do to have eternal life.” Jesus responded to him in verse 21 by saying, “If you want to be perfect, go and sell all your possessions and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.” Basically it amounted to the ruler understanding that nothing was greater and could come before his commit to Christ. Unfortunately, the ruler rejected Christ’s gift.



· A Bad Man – Luke 23:39-43; As Jesus hung suffering on the cross, a criminal who had also been crucified made the acknowledgement, “We deserve to die for our crimes, but this man hasn’t done anything wrong. Jesus, remember me when you come into your Kingdom.” Jesus replied, “I assure you, today you will be with me in paradise.” At the point of death, this man made the confession that Christ was who he said he was and accepted the sacrifice Christ was making. All heaven rejoices over one sinner who repents (Luke 15:7)!



· A Religious Man – Acts 9:1-18; Paul, who was circumcised when he was eight days old, a pure-blood citizen of Israel and a member of the tribe of Benjamin – a real Hebrew, a Pharisee, so zealous that he harshly persecuted the church, and obeyed the law without fault (Philippians 3:4-6), was converted on the road to Damascus, where he was going to “kill the Lord’s followers”. Here he has an encounter with the Living God and it changed his life forever!



· I believe that we each have a story, a testimony of salvation that is unique. I accepted Christ as my Lord and Savior when I was 10 years old. I was at a children’s activity where we were sending invitations to heaven to family members who didn’t know Christ. It was then that I realized that because of my sinful nature I would be eternally separated from God without Christ in my life. I remember praying and asking Christ to come into my life and be my Lord and Savior. It wasn’t long after that I followed in baptism – my unspoken testimony of my personal commitment to Christ.



I believe that the Bible is God’s written instructions of His plan of salvation. Christ provided the salvation that we read about in God’s written word. And Christ alone is sufficient for our salvation. He is the one that paid the ultimate sacrifice so that we, sinful man, may have eternal life. Hebrews 2:9 says, “What we do see is Jesus, who was given a position ‘a little lower than the angels’; and because he suffered death for us, he is now ‘crowned with glory and honor’. Yes, by God’s grace, Jesus tasted death for everyone.” “So what makes us think we can escape if we ignore this great salvation that was first announced by the Lord Jesus himself,” Hebrews 2:3a.



Fortunately for us, we cannot convict of sin and we cannot make someone “be saved,” this is part of the work of the Holy Spirit (John 16:8-9). A person’s salvation experience will be the work of the Holy Spirit convicting them of their need for the Savior, Jesus Christ. It is our responsibility as workers to “pray to the Lord who is in charge of the harvest (Matt. 9:37)”. Pray for workers, pray for souls. The Spirit of God intercedes for us but we are also to pray for one another (James 5:16). For someone, today is the day of their salvation! What about yours?