What Kind of Person Can Be Saved?
Originally posted on the Bibles for America Blog.
We sometimes receive questions from our readers, and while we can’t always answer each one, we thought our response to one reader’s inquiry on what kind of person can be saved might be helpful to many others. Below is our response, still in letter form.
Dear Reader,
Thank you for the question you sent in response to the post “How Can I Be Sure I’m Really Saved?” on our blog. You were concerned that you were not the kind of person that could be saved.
We’ll start by looking at what it means to be saved in the Bible. John 3:16 says,
“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that everyone who believes into Him would not perish, but would have eternal life.”
This verse shows us God’s great love for all mankind, a love so great that He gave His only Son, Jesus Christ, to die for us. Because of this, as the verse clearly states, every person in the world, each of whom is sinful and fallen, can be saved from perdition and receive eternal life by believing into Jesus Christ.
But a good question to ask here is, Why do people need to be saved?
To answer this, we have to see that the Bible tells us God created human beings as pure, sinless vessels to contain Him and to express Him. This was God’s intention for humanity. But, being deceived by Satan, mankind fell and was contaminated with something contrary to God’s nature—sin. Because God, who is holy, cannot enter into a sinful vessel, it seemed as if God could no longer carry out His purpose with humanity.
God could have given up on man, but instead, God became a man named Jesus Christ. Jesus died in our place to pay the penalty for all our sins and to redeem us back for God’s purpose. Jesus then resurrected, and in resurrection He became the life-giving Spirit, who is now available to people anytime and anywhere. So now, according to John 3:16, when any person believes into the Lord Jesus, the Son of God and Savior of the world, that person will not perish, but will have eternal life, the life of God.
John 3:16 uses the words “believe into,” versus “believe in.” To believe in Christ is merely to believe Christ existed. But to believe into Christ is to receive Him. It is to open our heart and receive Him as our Savior. When we do this, we receive the forgiveness of our sins, and the blood Jesus shed on the cross washes us. By His death, we are redeemed back to God.
But that’s not all. When we believe into Christ, we also receive Christ into us as our new life and our new person; we are born again with the divine life of God. In this way, we are brought back to the purpose God created us for. God in Christ comes to live in us, and He becomes our new source and our divine energy to put away our former life of sin in order to live a new life that pleases and expresses Him.
The Bible says in the book of Romans, “If you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.”
You can be saved right now by praying this prayer with a sincere heart:
Lord Jesus, I confess I am a sinner. Lord, thank You for loving me and dying on the cross for me. Forgive me of my sins and wash me with Your precious blood to make me a clean vessel. Lord, I believe into You, and I receive You right now. Lord Jesus, come into me and be my life. Thank you, Lord. Amen.
We thank God that He loves each one of us and desires every man to be saved, and we hope you find this reply helpful.
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