"A Wrong View of Salvation" (Acts 8:12-13)

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 12/11/2017 11:34 AM

My Worship Time                                                                  Focus:  A Wrong View of Salvation

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                 Reference:  Acts 8:12-13

            Message of the verses:  “12 But when they believed Philip preaching the good news about the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, they were being baptized, men and women alike. 13 Even Simon himself believed; and after being baptized, he continued on with Philip, and as he observed signs and great miracles taking place, he was constantly amazed.”

            We are looking at what happened when the Spirit –Filled Philip was preaching and people were being saved through believing that Jesus Christ was who He claimed to be, the Savior, and as they repented of their sins and believed they were baptized.  Sometimes when we think of how a person is saved, the process that he goes through we forget that repentance is a part of that process, for without a person knowing that they are a sinner, and then they will never believe that they need a Savior.  Now as we look at this section it seems that Simon was more interested in the outcome of what happened when Philip was preaching than looking at his own life, realizing that he was a sinner.

            Verse 12 shows us that Philip’s message consisted of two parts, the kingdom of God, and this refers to God’s sovereign rule over the sphere of salvation that is entered by those who belong to Him through faith in His Son.  Next we look at the second part “The name of Jesus Christ and this symbolizes all that Jesus Christ is, so first Philip’s message was about the realm of the saved, and then he zeroed in on the truths about who the Lord Jesus Christ is, as He alone provides entrance into that realm.  The result of his preaching was “the people believed and were being baptized, men and women alike.”  This is what Simon seems to be fascinated by as he saw many people being saved.  He saw things similar to what the Pharisees and other rulers of Israel saw, and that was Jesus was becoming more popular and they were losing their popularity, same now with Simon. However we read that “even Simon himself believed; and after begin baptized, he continue on with Philip.”    John MacArthur writes “First, he wanted to sustain contact with the people following the preacher.  By joining Philip’s movement, he went where the action was and kept his opportunity for influence alive.  Second, ‘as he observed signs and great miracles taking place, he was constantly amazed.’  He had, so to speak a professional interest in finding out the source of Philip’s amazing powers.  Third, as his later conduct shows, he wanted to figure out how to acquire that power for himself.  Magicians often sold each other their tricks and incantations.”

            Baptism does not save a person, however baptism is a picture of what happens to a person when they are saved.  Baptism pictures the death burial, and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ.  I was baptized three times, but only one time was it the biblical way to be baptized when I joined my first church after I was saved. 

            “Simon’s view of salvation was purely ritualistic, external matter, and additional act in his life instead of the total transformation of his whole person on the inside (2 Cor. 5:17), writes John MacArthur.  Once a person becomes a believer in Jesus Christ they will begin to produce fruit in their lives, and producing fruit is how one can tell that a person has become a believer.  I have quoted Ephesians 2:8-10 in many of my Spiritual Diaries and will do so once again here “8  For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; 9 not as a result of works, so that no one may boast. 10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.”  Verses 8-9 tell how a person was saved, and verse ten tells us what a person will do after he becomes a believer.  Not all persons’ who are baptized are true believers, and another thing that is important to know is that a person is only to be baptized after he or she becomes a believer, as sprinkling a baby after they are born certainly does not save them.  The word baptism is a transliteration of the Greek word and it means to dunk, or put under.  Baptism is not sprinkling for sprinkling does not describe what the word means.  “Not to be confused with 9:11, bapto. The clearest example that shows the meaning of baptizo is a text from the Greek poet and physician Nicander, who lived about 200 B.C. It is a recipe for making pickles and is helpful because it uses both words.  Nicander says that in order to make a pickle, the vegetable should first be ‘dipped’ (bapto) into boiling water and then ‘baptized’ (baptizo) in the vinegar solution. Both verbs concern the immersing of vegetables in a solution. But the first is temporary. The second, the act of baptizing the vegetable, produces a permanent change.

            “When used in the New Testament, this word more often refers to our union and identification with Christ than to our water baptism. e.g. #Mr 16:16. ‘He that believes and is baptized shall be saved’. Christ is saying that mere intellectual assent is not enough.  There must be a union with him, a real change, like the vegetable to the pickle!”  This article came from my Greek/English dictionary.” (Bible Study Magazine, James Montgomery Boice, May 1989).

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  “Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith; examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you-unless indeed you fail the test?”

My Steps of Faith for Today:  Trust that the Lord will give me wisdom to understand what I am to teach concerning the church of Thyatira this coming Sunday.

Memory verses:  Philippians 4:1, 8 “1 Therefore, my beloved brethren whom I long to see, my joy and crown, in this way stand firm in the Lord, my beloved.”  8 “Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things.”

Answer to yesterday’s Bible question:  “His thigh went out of joint” (Genesis 32:25).

Today’s Bible question:  “How much did five sparrows cost?”

Answer in our next SD.

12/11/2017 12:14 PM