of being a brother and co-laborer with the Lord. Pastor Campbell, we thank God for this opportunity. I want to talk to us about salvation. Let's take our Bibles and look at Jude, verse number 3. Jude, just before the book of Revelation, Verse 3, Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and to exhort you that you should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints. For there are certain men, crept in unaware, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness and denying the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ." He said, I want to write to you about the common salvation. In this instance, Jude felt compelled to go around and to deal with some of the other issues. But his desire was just to talk about the common salvation. And that's what I want to talk to us a little bit about. The common salvation. Salvation is deliverance. Salvation is sometimes the same Hebrew and Greek words are translated deliver, salvation, saved, health. So God has his best intention for mankind. He made man after his own image, after his own likeness, and God intended for man to live forever in the Garden of Eden situation. He's going to eventually give us that situation at the end, but God showed that man's heart could be turned away from God, turned away in the Garden of Eden, turned away with just a piece of fruit. It doesn't take much. A man can give his life for a piece of bread, the Bible says. And we know the Esau sold his birthright just for a mess of pottage. When you love somebody, and even if Adam and Eve loved the Lord, and fellowshiped with the Lord, and walked in the evening in the cool of the day with the Lord, we can be turned away so easily from our love relationships. At any moment, at any given time, under the influence of mankind, because we're not God, we cannot rule ourselves. We cannot bridle ourselves. I can't bridle my tongue. I can't make myself do anything. I need a master. I need a Lord. I need someone, when I do mess up, to pick me back up. Somebody said, well, get back up and try again. Well, I wouldn't have fallen if I could have done that. I wouldn't have fell in the first place. So I need somebody to pick me back up. The common salvation, it's for everybody. Of course, we know that all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. God made man after his image, after his likeness, and we've fallen short of that. We're not what God created man to be. He created us with the Shekinah glory on us. He created us with the glow of God about us. But when man fell, we lost that beauty of righteousness that was surrounding man, and we saw ourselves naked before God. We just know that But He meant for every man, woman, boy, and girl to have that glory, to have that godliness, godlikeness. We were made in His image. But many times in my life and yours and in the societies and cultures that we're living in, there's not much a man that looks like God at all. So what we do, we try to make God like us. And you're not going to bring God down. God is not going to ever be less than he is. God became a man, but he was the perfect man. God said, this is what I am. I don't have any unnatural thoughts. I'm loyal. I'm faithful. My character is impeccable. And this is what I intended you to be. But when we get born again, that seed of God is planted in us, and a new person is born. And we are to allow that new man to grow into that image of Christ that God intended us to be. And in eternities, you and I will have that image of God replanted in ourselves. And so it's a common salvation. It was meant to be for everybody. Everybody. That's why Jesus tasted death for every man. Because he intended every man to be restored from Mussolini, Hitler, Baghdadi, everybody. He intended everybody to be able to enjoy the purpose for their creation or procreation. So we find it is a common salvation. Look at Hebrews chapter 5, verse 9. Go back just a couple of books. Hebrews chapter 5, verse number 9. Again, verse 8 says, though he were a son Yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered and being made perfect Complete mature everything he was supposed to be as a man Jesus Christ he became the author of eternal salvation To unto all them that obey him And we know that the gospel of God demands obedience But the only but the two things of obedience or repentance toward God and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ That's the response of the human heart. I don't understand why when Jesus commanded it, the Apostle Paul said it, John said it, all the way through the Bible. It's repentance toward God and faith toward the Lord Jesus Christ. But we have many people that just really try to slice and dice that and say, well, faith in the Lord is not a man's work. It's not a work. But yet they say repentance toward God is. they're both the response of the human heart toward the mercy and grace of God and Toward the wrath of God and the holiness of God we repent toward God That all we're not what we're supposed to be We're going to have to have a supernatural help And so we turn to him and in faith we receive the substitutionary work of Jesus Christ and he becomes our righteousness. He becomes our peace. He becomes all the holiness that we'll ever have. And so he became the author of eternal salvation. So it's a common salvation. It's appeared to all men, for all men, but it's eternal salvation. Once God does something, it shall be forever. Whatever God doeth, it never fails. It lasts forever because He lasts forever. He can't undo But so it's a not just a common salvation. It's eternal salvation and in one more place look back to Hebrews chapter 2 verse 3 Verse 2 says for if the word spoken by angels was steadfast and every Transgression and disobedience received a just recompensive reward Somebody says to me all the time, well, I just don't think God is fair. I've witnessed a lot of people. God's not fair. And I always ask them this. Now, do you really want Him to be fair? Do you really want God to start being fair with you today? Do you want to start getting what you deserve today? I'd know I want him to continue having mercy and grace and long-suffering and patience and and and I would have continued to receive the good grace of God Knowing I don't deserve it So it's not just the common salvation it's not just eternal salvation go on it says If we got what we deserve it is just If I go to hell today God would be just if it wasn't for Jesus. Because He's just and He's the justifier of them that believe in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation? So it's a common salvation. It's eternal salvation. It's a great salvation. It's so great, just like God so loved the world, this salvation that we're dealing with and that we're trying to just give to people. God is just trying to give it to people. It is so great, and yet I wonder when people listen to me and look at my life and follow me, I wonder if they think it's so great. We ought to be such a picture of the marvelous, good grace of God's gospel and God's salvation that people say, wow, that is so great. I mean, Pastor Campbell and that old evangelist, Mike Farman, Wow! They are tremendous. I mean, look what God has done in their life. Wow! But I'm afraid most of us live way below what God has actually purchased for us. It is so great. Now, there's so... I'm at 17 places about so loved, so great, so... good, so there's many so's in the Bible, in New Testament especially. And so it's so great a salvation. And so I want to just think about this. When God saves people, when God saves people, what are the characteristics of those people that God saves? He saved the good ones. Good people don't go to heaven. Forgiven sinners go to heaven. You don't go to heaven because you're good. Because we're saved, because Christ is in us, we therefore can do some good, because that's all Jesus can do, is good. But who is it that God saves? Look at 2 Samuel 22, 28. 2 Samuel, from Genesis to Revelation, it's the same salvation all the way through. That's my view. So, 2 Samuel 22, verse number 28, the Bible says, and the afflicted people thou wilt save." Who does God save? Afflicted people. Why do we have to get into a place of affliction before we say, oh God, save me? Well, we're proud. There is no one in this room that should have a haughty spirit. Whatever we are, we are by the good grace of God. I am proud of Him, but I cannot put pride... In fact, I find no place in the Bible where pride is a positive thing. It's not found positively. It's always a negative thing. It's always a sinful thing. What we usually say when we say, well, I'm proud of such and such, what we're saying is they're honoring the Lord. There's an honor there. And my child getting straight A's, that's honored their parents. That's honored their name. That's honored the school. And that's honored their teachers. It's an honor that we're really talking about, not pride. But we've substituted a lot of words. And somebody says, well, I'm proud of my son. Well, I understand what they mean. And I'm not going to slap, you know, slap them or nothing. I'm just saying, you know, I'm proud of my son in a human sense. But what I'm really saying is my son has honored my name, my wife, and honored the Lord. That's all. I'm interested in his honor. And I'm interested in our lives. I'm interested in independent Baptist churches just honoring God. That's all I want not looking great not being pretty just Doing and being everything we're supposed to be to bring glory and honor to the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ So God saves afflicted people And we're not going to look at all these but I'm going to say in Job chapter 5 verse 15. God said I shall deliver the poor Jesus himself said blessed are the poor in spirit, but they shall be gone. Oh A lot of people say, well, I don't see this, and I can't see that, and I don't understand this. Well, Jesus also said, blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. The reason a lot of us don't see God in our circumstances, or in our providences, or in the situations we get in, is because we don't have a pure heart about it. If we'd have a pure heart, we'd see God in this thing. We'd sense God in this thing. So He saves the afflicted people. He saves the poor. Job 22, 29. The humble person thou wilt save or deliver. I want you to look this one up. Job 26, verse 2. Job 26, verse 2. I preach this series of sermons on chapter 26 at several Bible colleges around the country and around the world. some of my favorite verses. But in Job 26 verse 1, but Job answered and said, talking to his three friends that have reproved him and rebuked him and accused him and had no evidence to back up any of their accusations, he said, How hast thou helped him that is without power? How savest thou the arm that hath no strength, saving Job said, how have you saved me? I didn't have the strength to do what you were requiring of me. So salvation, and there's 20 verses under that, God saves people that have no strength. If you could have done it, why did Jesus Christ die? If you could have been good enough, held out long enough, Why did Jesus die? Because some people would have made it. But the truth is, nobody could make it. Nobody. And so Jesus became somebody so that nobodies could attach their insignificant self to the one that inhabits all of eternity, all at the same time, and go to heaven on his coattails. Go to heaven on his righteousness. And so God saves afflicted people. God saves and delivers the poor. God saves the humble person. Job 26 too. He saves those that have no strength. As long as you think you can do it, God will let you try. But we need to stop trying and start trusting. We need to trust the Lord to do what only God can do. God, in salvation, God helps those that admit they're helpless. As long as you think you're okay, as long as you think you can make it, as long as you know you can get baptized seven more times, four and three times backwards, as long as you think you can give enough money, as long as you think you can join enough churches, as long as you think you can turn over a few more new leaves in your life, He'll let you try. But when you come to the end of yourself and say, I can't do it. I've got to have a savior. Now you're qualified to be saved. God delivers people that admit they are helpless. Now when it comes after you get saved, God saves those and delivers those that help themselves. So all that God has bought for us. You have to access all this good grace by faith. Therefore being justified by faith we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ by whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand and rejoice in the glory of God. So he helps those of us that are saved because we have the helper inside. We have the hope of the scriptures and we have the promises and the power to do what he tells us to do. But we just have to help ourselves and do what he's told us by faith. with that grace. Access grace, access prayer, access scriptures, access promises, access the help of the brethren. We can do it if we'll access all that He's made available for us. And so He saves afflicted people, poor people, humble people, people with no strength. Psalm 34 verse 18. Next book over, Psalm 34 verse 18. I'm not telling you anything you don't already know. I'm trying to verify this thing that it is a common salvation. It is eternal salvation. And I'm telling you, it is a great salvation. It's great because this is what qualifies you to get it. Humble, poor, afflicted, without strength, We know that in Romans chapter 6, when we were yet without strength, this is Romans chapter 5, for when we were yet without strength, Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man would one die, yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare deny. But God commended his love toward us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. He sees our helplessness He's as a shepherd seeing the sheep who are trapped sheep who are under attack by the wolves and and and just draws his heart out to us when we realize our Circumstances our situation We're dead and trespassing and we gotta have a safe and the Lord himself says I the Lord That's why it says which was your call upon the name of the Lord don't be saving the Lord becomes your Savior Then you spend the rest of your life learning how to submit to that loving Lordship. It's not the submitting first. It's recognition first. Then asking Him to save you. Then submitting. Man, it takes your whole life. I'm not learned how to do that yet. But I'm just a child. I've only been saved 44 years. One of these days I'm going to grow up, but you can't make me. Psalm 34 verse 8. Yes, 18. 34 verse 18. The Bible says, The Lord is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart, and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit. What does God say? It's a common salvation. It's eternal salvation. It's a great salvation. All you have to do to qualify is to have a contrite heart. A broken heart. This is a parent poem in Hebrew. Parallelism, what it says in the first part of the verse. He's repeating it in a different way so you understand each self-defining term. Contrite heart. Oh, I'm a sinner. I know it. Oh, I wish I wasn't. I wish I could bring glory and honor to you. I wish I wasn't this way. I wish I hadn't made decisions to trap me in this lifestyle. And I'm looking to you. I've got a broken heart. I'm contrite about it. I'm not. Well, let's get off my nose. God made me this way. It's just the way I am. You're going to have to set me the way I am. At least I'm sorry about it. I've said enough courtrooms to know that I've seen some people. The judge said this, this is evidence, this evidence, this evidence, this evidence. What do you have to say for yourself? Yeah, I did all that. That's right up. What are you going to do anymore? He said, that's just the way I am. God doesn't have to save that kind of person. He knows our hearts. God will take any sinner just as you are. As long as you have no intention of staying that way. Because He knows your heart. He knows the intent of our heart. Because God has no intentions of leaving you the way He finds you. But when you're coming will it I want to change I want you to change me I want to be what you want me to be God. I'm sorry. I you know, I'll call it anything you want. I call it God saves afflicted people poor people humble people weak people contrite people needy people so on 73 13 Zephaniah 319 those that halt and When you stop halting between two opinions, as Elijah did on Mount Carmel, how long will you halt between two opinions? You kind of start going this way, then you say, no, I'm going to go that way. They were halting. They just couldn't make the decision one way or the other. So when you stop halting, I'll say, are you going to be for God, or are you going to be for the devil? You're going to be for God's righteousness or you're going to be for the world's ways? You're going to go after God or you're going to go after your flesh and do what your flesh does? Which one do you want? Make your decision. You want me or you want those things? If you would rather have a... Somebody asked me one time, well, I would be your Sunday school teacher but you've got too many qualifications. I said, well, wait a minute. If God has gifted you to teach and it's evident that God's got his hand on you, and we definitely needed somebody to teach Sunday school, I said, if I required you to stop eating Snickers candy bars, you wouldn't give up Snickers candy bars in order to teach? Well, no. I said, then that's the reason I haven't chosen you. People get stuck on, well, He's worthy. My dad could ask me not to do something even if it was okay to do. Because I was his son. There were certain things that were wrong for me to do as a teenage boy that wasn't wrong in the Bible. Because I was under my dad's authority. Remember those great men in the book of Jeremiah? Jonah's dad? His sons couldn't live in a house. His sons couldn't eat raisins. His sons couldn't do anything like that. And Jeremiah, God just so said, man, that's a great father. He required things of his son that I didn't even require. We all want our liberty. How about the Holy Ghost getting his way every once in a while? There's something, if you're a missionary, you don't have to go to the foreign field. You don't have to establish a church in downtown Indianapolis. There's nothing in the Bible requiring you to do that. But God put it on his heart. God put it on his heart. If you love the Lord, he can tell me to do things just because he knows I love him. If you love me, keep my commandments. But he said, if you love me, you'll keep my words. That's my thoughts. God said, it's not right or wrong, but this is what I'd like you to do. My wife has been happily married to me for 44 years. She's just one lucky lady, that's all I can tell you. There's a lot of things I ask her to do, not whether it's right or wrong. She just wants to do it because it pleases me. There's some things that God doesn't require of me, but I want to do those things because they're pleasing. Just for His pleasure. And we got we got a Christianity today that unless I have to do it, I'm not gonna do it I'm gonna do what I want to do when I want to do the way I want to do it why I wanted it all is it and God demands it, okay? How about if you just got a desire for you to do that delight thyself also in the Lord and give Your desire will be you want to please him so God saves The characteristics of those saved there people that perish people are lost people their sinners of people that are dying How does God save? He saves people out of the hand of the enemy 2nd Samuel 1019 he saves people out of adversity Psalm 34 verse 6 he saves people out of their troubles Psalm 107 verse 13, he saves them out of their distresses. He said in Matthew 1, or Ezekiel 37, 23, he said out of their dwelling place. What kind of a salvation would have been if Jesus had left that Gadarene demoniac in the tomb? Yeah, he's still living there. Yeah, but Jesus saved me. I'm still living in the tombs. Still don't have no clothes on. People still afraid of me. But I'm saved. It wouldn't be him that you have bad feelings about. It would be the one that said he was saved. God saved you? Jesus came by your way and left you in the tombs? That's not a salvation. I'm getting kicked out of a mission conference right there. that they did. I don't have a problem with people who have a difference of opinion on repentance and faith and all that kind of thing. Some of them make them both the same exact thing or whatever. But the two sides of the same coin, heads and tails, if you've got a head on both sides of that coin, you know you've got a counterfeit. You've got a positive and a negative, or you're not going to have a charge on the batter. You've got to have repentance and faith. I don't have a problem with people that even blend them sometimes. The problem is when they deny one. That's where I get my issue. Out of distresses, Matthew 121, out from their sins. If a drunk remains a drunk, it takes a while for all these maturing and growing in grace, but the whole purpose of salvation is to get you out of your sins. You won't take that to heaven with you. The reason I have notes is not for me to know what I want to say. It's to keep me limited. My wife said, quit writing on that note. You've got enough stuff there. Okay out of their sins Ezekiel 35 36 29 out from all of your uncleannesses When God God saves you he wants to come complete change It's a great salvation It's not a namby-pamby one It's an eternal one One of these days that new person that's down on the inside of Michael jerk Thurman Some days Jesus, but most of the time it's a jerk. I'm trying not to be a jerk, but I jerk people around a little bit. The characteristics of those that are saved, how people are saved, he gets them out. Why does God say poor sinners? I was just asking myself a question. Psalm 37, verse 40. Psalm 37 verse 40, I think the Enclosure Bible is right there in that area, 37 verse number 40, and the Lord shall help them and deliver them, he shall deliver them from the wicked and save them because they trust in him. Why does God say four sentences? He sees our heart, He looks in our eyes, He trusts in us. That young lady, when I met her at the altar that day, I looked in her eyes and I had to say, forsaking all others, keep yourself only to yourself, as long as you both shall live. She had to look me in the eye and say, I trust you. I had to look her in the eye and say, I trust you. I said, I do. I will. God looks in our eyes and we look at Him. And I trust you, Jesus. No doubt. I can trust him. He's going to keep all of his promises. You and I are all different. We all have different needs and different necessities, and we're imbalanced and out of character, and everybody's personality is different. But if every one of us in our need look into his eyes, You name me one reason why you wouldn't trust me. Why? He said, believe me. He said, believe me. The hour has come and now is when all men shall worship the Father. Now, I'm the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father but by me. Look him in the eye and tell me he's a liar. Tell me you've got some other way. Jesus said no. You've got to come to me. Come unto me, all ye that labor heavily. I will give you rest. Trusting? Then bring your case to Jesus. In your need, in your commonality with man, all have seen to come short of the glory of God. There's none righteous, no, not one. All those other things, Romans chapter 1 and chapter 2, come before Romans chapter 3. I wish people would not leave out Romans chapter 1 and 2. Take them straight to chapter 3. But, because chapter 2 verse 4 says it's the goodness of God that leadeth thee to repentance. You've got to come to a place where you realize you're without excuse, worthy of the judgment of God, and guilty before a thrice holy God. Now, put your faith in Him. Because if you really didn't need Him, why do you need to trust Him? If you really weren't the sinner He says you are, Why you need to say hold on try a little a little further wait a little longer Wake up in hell one day So why does he say because it trusts in him he said Psalms 86 He said save thy servant that trusteth in thee several times through there Acts 16 verse 30 believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. I believe on the Lord Jesus Christ But I don't believe guy has to go to church. I He's the one that told us we would go to church. So you trust him, but you don't believe what he says? Well, I trust in the Lord. I don't believe you have to be baptized in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. Isn't that what Jesus said? You say you trust him, but you don't believe his words? That's how he said do it. So when you baptize, you've got to say, baptize in the name of the Lord. They baptize in the name of Jesus. Well, how did he say do it? in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. So I believe Jesus, and I do it the way he said to do it. So you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, Luke 8, 12. Believe and be saved. We've already went over all the qualifying terms. You've got to know you need to save. You've got to understand you're short of the glory of God. You're not righteous. Jesus said, except your righteousness exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no wise enter the kingdom of heaven. You've got to be better than the best Pharisee. And who's the best Pharisee in the Bible? Saul of Tarsus. The one that became the Apostle Paul because God's son smote him down on the Damascus road. And he said, who art thou, Lord? that I'm Jesus, and I'll persecute you." He said, Lord, what would you have me to do? You ever ask the Lord that? You could have smote him and sent him to hell. He smote him off the ground and spoke to him out of a bright light. He said, Lord, what can Jesus not tell you to do? My wife and I used to joke, I went to Avon High School, she went to Plainfield, so we were natural rivals. She had the good sense to marry an Avon boy, but... Okay, well, that was a great mistake in her life, but we got through that because of the grace of God. And so, we joked about, Lord, you can send us anywhere, call us anywhere, just not to Mooresville. Because that was both of our schools' rivals. I spent many years in Morgan County. Not in Mooresville, the next little town south of Mooresville called Brooklyn. It was far worse than anything Mooresville ever thought about being. And so we lived many years and served the Lord in Morgan County. So I don't tell the Lord where I don't want to go, because he already knows. Why does God say that? He says because we call upon His name. We call upon Him. We go before the judge and say, I plead, I'm asking Jesus to plead my case. I call upon Him. I've designated Him as my personal representative in this matter. Whatever He says, I'll accept it. He speaks for me. power of attorney. I signed the paper. Jesus stands before Almighty God. Says, I paid his hands in full. I said, I believe him. I go with Jesus. But who is the Savior? For there is none of the name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved. That name Jesus is thrown around a lot. But it's the name that even in most pagan parts of India. They know the difference between the Jesus of the Bible and the Jesus of the demons. Because many demons are named Jesus. They recognize his name even when it's in English. Not Malawi or Kannada or Hindi or Telugu. I've been to India many times. My wife and I spent January last year or this year in India. We'll be going again next February. Philippines, India, Brazil, Mexico, wherever I can go. They recognize His name and they fall down and kick and scream and squall. Their eyes roll back in their heads. But no, no, no. Jesus. The Lord Jesus Christ, your creator. In the beginning was the Word, the Word was with God, the Word was God, the same as in the beginning was God. All things were made by Him. at Jesus by His authority. Boy, pretty soon they just calm down. I can get the devil out of people, but it takes their choice to get Jesus in. Because if they don't, they'll be seven times worse than they were before. Jesus has cleaned up many a man and woman's life. Got the devil out of them. If you don't invite Jesus Christ into your heart and life, that devil will return and bring seven more worse than himself, or 12 more. Well, who is a Savior? His name is Jesus Christ. Born to us, born this day in the city of David, a Savior is Christ the Lord. The angel from heaven spoke and said, Bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people now if your gospel is it is just to some I Got that angel said the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ is to all men For unto you is born this day of this in the city of David a Savior who's Christ the Lord That's why A Mormon Jesus cannot save you. A Jehovah Witness Jesus cannot save you because they're not the Jesus of this Bible. Jesus is the virgin-born son of God. God in the flesh. Great is the mystery of God. God was manifest in the flesh. His name shall be called Emmanuel, which being interpreted as God with us. So who is the Savior? His name is Jesus. It's a great salvation. It's an eternal salvation. And it is a common salvation. And it's for all men. Father, we love you. We ask your blessings on you. Help us to get our thoughts on thee and appreciate who you are and what you've done in Jesus' name.