WHY DID GOD SAVE ME?

Pastor John Samson

"But God who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us..." Ephesians 2:4

One of the most difficult questions for anyone to answer is this,

"Why did God save me?"

I've been studying the Bible for well over 20 years now, and I still can't come up with an exhaustive reason to explain why God saved me, or anyone else for that matter.

Of course, I could give a very surface level answer and say that the reason God saved you was because you responded to the call of the Gospel and made Jesus the Lord and Savior of your life. That is certainly a correct and legitimate answer because we are justified through faith in Christ and we have put our faith in Christ.

But we need to go a little deeper and ask the question, "Why did you respond to the gospel when you heard it, but someone else who heard it did not? What was there in you that caused you to respond positively while others did not?" I ask that about my own life.

GOD FORBID

Now I could say that the reason I responded was that I was more righteous than the other person. But God forbid! That's obviously not the right answer.

Or I could say that I was more intelligent than the other person, but I wouldn't want to say that either. Even if that were true, which it isn't, it would still bring us back to the God who gave us intelligence in the first place. No, I believe the answer can be found in one word, GRACE. I can't find any other scriptural answer as to why I am saved but grace, wonderful undeserved and amazing grace.

MAN - NOT SICK, BUT DEAD!

The Bible is clear about why God initiates salvation: because He loved us. But when we get down to the specifics of why He intervened to save us, we need to go to a passage such as Ephesians 2:1-10. There, Paul paints a vivid description of our spiritual condition - and its not a pretty sight at all. In fact, we were not just unhealthy, sick, or even mortally ill, but actually... we were dead towards God. The picture is not of a dying man on a death bed, but of a corpse in a mortuary! All was hopeless. Our condition was described as "dead in trespasses and sins." Before we were converted to Christ, we were biologically alive but spiritually dead. Yet it was a strange death, because while dead, we were up and about, walking like zombies. Yet when in this hopeless condition, it was not our super intelligence, or some island of righteousness still left in us, by which we made a virtuous choice to receive Christ. No, the Scripture says that at the exact time that we were dead (Greek: necros - dead like a corpse), God made us alive. God did it all!

If this is the case that we were spiritually dead, how is it that we are now alive towards God, and desire to know Him at all?

The answer that scripture gives to this question has a double effect upon us: it both humbles man and exalts God's grace.

Can a corpse raise itself to life? Can a corpse choose to become alive? No, dead people can't make choices. Think about Lazarus, the man who was raised from physical death in John chapter 11. Jesus did not reason with Lazarus to see if resurrection was something he might be interested in. No, He graciously and powerfully called him out of the grave saying "Lazarus, come forth!" Once Lazarus was made alive by Christ, he then had the ability to respond and make all the necessary choices to follow Him. But the point is that whilst still dead, no such choice could be made. Lazarus' resurrection was ALL of Christ and NONE of him, and all the glory for it goes to Christ alone. Similarly, our resurrection from spiritual death is ALL of God and NONE of us, and all the glory goes to Him.

BIOLOGICALLY ALIVE BUT SPIRITUALLY DEAD

Before we came to Christ though we were biologically alive, we were spiritually dead. We were very much physically alive as we were walking
"according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience and were by nature the children of wrath" (Eph 2: 2, 3) fully deserving God's justice, and therefore eternal damnation. In this state, we had no interest in God whatsoever. Perhaps some of us may have had an interest in religion or even the benefits of belonging to the kingdom of God (such as peace, health, safety, etc.), but what is clear is that we did not want to know God.

The Apostle Paul writes, "And you were dead in your trespasses and sins... BUT GOD, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that
(both the grace and the faith) not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast." (Eph 2:1, 4-9)

The original language of verse 8 is very clear that both the grace we received and the faith we exercised to be born again were the gift of God, not as a result of works at all. Philippians 1:29 confirms that faith is a gift - "it has been given you to believe in Him..."

Outside of Divine intervention, the scripture declares that "there is no God seeker" (Romans 3:11, literal rendering), as while still in the flesh we are the enemies of Christ and will in no way submit to His rule (Romans 5:10; 8:7, 8). The things of the Spirit of God are foolishness to us as a "natural man" as we have no capacity to know them "nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned" (1 Cor 2:14). We have a will alright, but it is a will that doesn't want Christ.

JOHN 6:44

This is in full accord with Jesus' own words, "No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him, and I will raise him up at the last day." (John 6:44). Notice that the one drawn here is also raised up at the last day, which according to verses 39 and 40 is referring to having eternal life.

Lets look at John 6:44 a little more closely. Jesus said,

"No one (a universal negative)

can (speaking of ability, not permission)

come to Me (Literally, "No one is able")

unless (an exceptive clause)

the Father who sent Me draws him

and I will raise him up at the last day."

WHEN DID THIS HAPPEN?

God's love moved Him to intervene on behalf of His elect while we were dead towards God, as He supernaturally intervened to make us alive (spiritually), effectively drawing us to Christ.

When did this take place? The Apostle Paul wrote.... "even when we were dead in trespasses (He) made us alive..." Eph. 2:5. That's clear isn't it? It was "when we were dead" that God made us alive.

WHICH COMES FIRST - ENTERING THE KINGDOM OF GOD OR BEING BORN AGAIN?

Jesus said it this way, "Unless a man is born again, he cannot enter the kingdom of God." (John 3:3,5)

Jesus emphatically states that we have to be born again before we can enter the kingdom. The unregenerate (or non-born again people) do not have the ability to enter the kingdom. Yet once they are made alive, by God's action alone, being "born again" or "born from above" (John 3:3), they can then enter the kingdom of God.

REGENERATION PRECEDES FAITH

The Reformers of the 16th Century (Martin Luther, John Calvin, etc.) expressed this truth is these words, "Regeneration precedes faith."

Though the process can very well take place in a very small space of time, logically, we have to be made alive (regenerated) before we can come to Christ and put our faith in Him to be justified. For instance Lazarus, once made alive by Christ, could then respond and make all the necessary choices to follow Him. But the point is that while Lazarus was still dead no such choice could be made. Lazarus' resurrection was ALL of Christ and NONE of him. In the same way, our salvation is ALL of Christ and NONE of us, as God raised us from spiritual death.

We were dead like a corpse in trespasses and sins, the children of wrath, the very enemies of God (Rom 5:10), commiting cosmic treason every day of our lives, yet the two most wonderful words of the Gospel are found in Ephesians 2:4..... "BUT GOD!"

God had a plan to save His people which was in place long before the world began.

"Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him. In love, He predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of His glory, by which He made us accepted in the Beloved.... being predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of His will." (Eph 1:3-6, 11)

"But we are bound to give thanks to God always for you, brethren beloved by the Lord, because God from the beginning chose you for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth, to which He called you by our gospel, for the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ." (2 Thess 2:13, 14)

"All that the Father gives Me will come to Me..." (John 6:37)

"And as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed." (Acts 13:48)

"they stumble, being disobedient to the word, to which they also were appointed. But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvellous light; who once were not a people but now are the people of God, who had not obtained mercy but now have obtained mercy." (1 Peter 2:8-10)

"(for the children not yet being born, nor having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works but of Him who calls), it was said to her, "The older will serve the younger." As it is written, "Jacob I have loved, but Esau I have hated." What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? Certainly not! For He says to Moses, "I will have mercy on whomever I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whomever I will have compassion." So then, it is not of him who wills, nor of him who runs, but of God who shows mercy."

(Rom 9:11-16)

Boasting is excluded. "Salvation is of the Lord" (Jonah 2:9).

Soli Deo Gloria - To God alone be the glory!