What Must I Do To Be Saved?

In Acts 16, we find a man who is at his lowest point in life. He was in a desperate situation with no way out. There was a great earthquake that caused the prison doors to open and the prisoners to be set free. In those days, if a jailer allowed prisoners to escape it would often result in their death. Because of his failure, he decided to end his own life (Acts 16:27).

As he drew his sword, he heard a voice cry out, "Do thyself no harm: for we are all here." These words provided a great comfort for the jailer. He ran into their cell and found Paul and Silas still there, despite their ability to leave. Overcome with relief, the jailer asked them a very important question, "Sirs, what must I do to be saved?"

Of all the questions that can be asked in life, none are more important than this one. What must I do to be saved? Notice how simple Paul's answer was... "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved" (Acts 16:31). Did you notice what he didn't say?

He didn't say...

• You need to be baptized.

• You need to be a good person.

• You need to go to church.

• You need to read your Bible.

He simply said, "You need to believe." Salvation is simple. As humans, we naturally want to have a part in getting to heaven. We want to believe that we are going to heaven because we are a good person. We want to believe that our decision to get baptized will allow us to go to heaven. We think that our faithfulness to church, prayer, or Bible reading will appeased Almighty God and cause him to open heaven's gates for us when our life is over. But salvation has nothing to do with us. In fact, it's because of our works that we need salvation in the first place.

Romans 3:23 - "For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God;"

He is perfect, holy, and righteous. Our sin separates us from God. We need to realize that God's standard is not "really good." His standard is perfection. Once we have sinned, no amount of good works, church attendance, or scripture reading will cause us to be perfect. One sin is enough to send someone to hell.

Ephesians 2:8-9 - "For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast."

Works can't save us. We are saved by grace through faith. According to scripture, we are saved by repenting. In context, this is not talking about turning away from sin (i.e. stop sinning), because sin will always be part of our lives, and that would be considered a good work. Instead, repent means "to turn away from." As we saw earlier, mankind naturally believes that we earn salvation in one way or another, but salvation is when we turn away from that idea and turn to Christ. Salvation is repenting from our efforts to earn heaven and trusting fully in the life, death, burial, and resurrection of Christ to save us. It must be 0% us and 100% Him.

Once someone is saved, they should no longer desire to sin like they used to. They should desire to do good works. They should desire to serve God. They should be baptized in obedience to the Father (just like Jesus), but none of these things play a role in our salvation. These are not requirements for salvation... they are products of our salvation.

So... What must you do to be saved? Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Stop trusting in your own good works and fully trust in the finished work of Christ today.