“What Elect Sinners Must Believe”
When I was in false religion, I always
assumed it was God’s intention or purpose to save all men and women without
exception. I was wrongly taught that Christ came, lived, died, and rose again
in order for God to save those who “would
open their heart’s door”, allowing Him to take up residence in their
hearts. Little did I know that such
teaching only opened the door for self-righteous, lost, sinners to glory in
their work of faith, instead of giving God the glory and honor, due only unto
Him for saving sinners by His grace. His grace is His unmerited favor based on
perfect satisfaction to God’s law and justice by His Son, Jesus Christ.
Lost sinners have a tendency to put a lot
of stock in their faith, i.e., their belief.
However, the Scriptures make it quite clear how inadequate man’s faith
really is: “Lord I believe, HELP THOU MY UNBELIEF.”(Mk.2:24) At our
best state, even those justified by Christ are forced to confess that if salvation
were conditioned on their faith at anytime, they would be forever lost-“O wretched man that I am! who
shall deliver me from the body of this death?”(Rom.7:24)
I recently have seen all these vehicles
running around with one word pasted on the back window: ‘B E L I E V E.’ Maybe you have one of them on your car. Tell me,
‘What good does this one word do for some sinner in a
state of lostness, one who by nature is at enmity
(bitter hatred) against God?’ “Because the carnal mind is enmity against
God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.”(Rom.8:7) James put it like this: “Thou believest that there is one God; thou
doest well: THE DEVILS ALSO BELIEVE,
and tremble.”(James 2:19) It’s not enough to flippantly throw around words
like “believe”, or “accept Jesus as your personal savior”, because if “the
devils also believe, AND TREMBLE”,
what good will belief (faith) do a sinner who is “dead in trespasses and sin”?
Every justified sinner who has been
regenerated and converted, brought to a knowledge of what was actually obtained
for them in their representative man, the Lord Jesus Christ, knows that we do
call on sinners to believe-“And they
said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt
be saved, and thy house.”(Acts 16:31) “And
this is His commandment, That we should believe on the
name of His Son Jesus Christ, and love one another, as He gave us commandment.”(I Jn.3:23) If you’ll
notice, both these passages say “believe ON” Christ, not “believe in”
Christ. We call on God’s elect
everywhere to rest (rely) ON
Christ’s righteousness ALONE as
their only hope of salvation-“And this is
the record, that God HATH GIVEN
(lit., already legally given to us by imputation and representation) to us eternal life, and this life is in his
Son.”(I Jn.5:11) I’m not calling on
you to believe in order to obtain or gain salvation. I’m calling on you to rest
in the FACT that Christ has redeemed
and justified His elect by His perfect obedience and bloody sacrifice at
Richard Warmack is Pastor of Grace Baptist in