Wirksworth | 03/05/26 | Salvation Through Jesus Alone | Steve Bagnall

Wirksworth 

Podcast: https://www.buzzsprout.com/354059/episodes/19116070-wirksworth-03-05-26-salvation-through-jesus-alone-steve-bagnall.mp3

Steve continued our series of church fundementals, looking at salvation being through Jesus alone.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:02

They let me talk a bit. Um actually start with an apology because I think last time I spoke, and I don't know why, I kind of changed my mind last minute on on the message that I was gonna give. You know, I really wasn't myself at all, and I don't think I did it justice, and I'm sure the words were fine, but I wasn't myself, and God's like, what are you doing that for? So we're called to be who we are, right? And um so today I'm bringing it from the streets. Um we're gonna go back to old school. So I'm gonna start with a joke. Oh my goodness, okay, this isn't biblical. Um so the Christian man, he passes away. Can't be even doing this. Christian man passes away and he meets Peter at the pearly gates, also not biblical. Okay, fine, right, that doesn't happen. Um and Peter says, Hi, you know, welcome. You need a thousand points to get in. So the guy's like, alright, well, you so Peter's like, tell me the good stuff you've done. And he said, Well, I never cheated on my wife, you know, I'm not even in my head. So, and Peter says, That's great, one point. And the guy's like, Oh my goodness, all right. Peter's like, well, what else? What else have you done? And he said, Well, I went to church every single Sunday, every Sunday, and I read my Bible every morning and I prayed and I worshipped. And Peter's like, Ah, that's amazing. Two points. And the guy's like, Oh, okay. So Peter's like, what else have you done? The guy's like, well, I started the homeless charity. I started the homeless charity, and I get, you know, gave everything away and I did I did everything, I served all the time. And Peter's like, well, okay, that's fantastic. Three points. And the guy's like, well, I'm never gonna get how am I gonna get to the only way I'm gonna get to heaven is by the grace of God. And Peter says, Now you get it. And that's my talk for the day. My talk for the day. I you know what, I googled a couple of other Christian jokes and they I couldn't bring them. Um so if you want to hear them separately, I can do them for you. Today's topic is salvation through Jesus alone. It's what we believe as a church. We're going through our fundamentals as a church, it's what we believe, it's what we believe to be the truth, it's what we see, it's what we read, it's what we feel, it's what we hear. Salvation is through Jesus alone. We know the story of the fall, Adam and Eve had everything they could ever want, but it wasn't enough. And with the help of a convincing serpent, they ate from the tree. Sin entered the world that day. And everyone who's been born since has been born with an inherent sinful nature. Disease entered the world, famine entered the world, hatred, anger, fear, all entered the world from that moment on, and that's what we live with now. Then we get the Old Testament. The Jewish people had a load of ceremonial laws, rituals, sacrifices, it's all very religious. In fact, we often get bored of reading Leviticus. Neil preached on Leviticus, didn't he? Was it the first meeting here?

SPEAKER_00 2:52

It was on Bench.

SPEAKER_01 2:56

It was Iris' fault, yeah. We can actually find it entertaining, can't we? Looking it, and we we almost feel sorry for the people back then having to sort of follow those rules and where do you get the dubs from in the first place? And you know, all these sort of things that they have to do in order to pay for their sin, the sacrifices they have to make in order to do that. And it's you know, I ate pork last night and I'm pretty sure I'm wearing mixed fibres, so I would be the worst one at it. The entire Old Testament is a prophecy of a Saviour coming. Around 300 prophecies to be exact. God's big story, the ultimate sacrifice, the one who would repair the bridge between us and heaven, the one who would repair our relationship with God, the one who would make heaven accessible to all mankind. We know that. I've referenced probably far too many times Jesus as being Bruce Willis. Hear me out. He's stuck in the middle of the ocean. Flailing, the waves are around. And Bruce Willis comes on his Apache helicopter, puts his hand down to you. Well, you're gonna take it. And that's what Jesus does. We are flailing without him. We can hang on for a bit. We might survive for a bit, but the reality is we need Jesus in his Apache helicopter, also not biblical. The writer Charles Spurgeon wrote that salvation is older than creation. I picked up on this recently, and we know that. We know Jesus is there from the beginning. We know that Jesus is there before creation, but I'd never really sat with that, I never really knew what to what to sort of take from that. Why was Jesus there from the beginning? Well, because God ordains everything. He knew that we were going to fall into sin. He knew exactly what had happened. But Jesus wasn't a plan B. God didn't make a mistake. It's just the way it goes, it's just the way it went. Jesus' birth, death, and resurrection were planned and ordained before the universe even existed. Someone else can give a talk on predestination, but I'm not doing that. Steve? Who's got the Trinity? Have you got the Trinity? I was once told, it was when I was first saved, actually, I never got this either. Salvation is a bigger miracle from God than creation. Just let that sit for a minute. Salvation is a bigger miracle from God than creation. God spoke the earth into existence in six days. And he didn't rest because he was tired, he rested because that was the sign of completion. Someone had to die for our salvation. God spoke the earth into existence for six days. Everything we see, the planets, the stars, the moon, everything that we have, all of creation, was spoken by God, without even challenging him, as far as we ever know, into existence. But someone had to die for us to be redeemed. That's big, right? Good, that's the right answer, guys. God said, let there be light and there was light. But our salvation, Jesus had to go to the cross. Not only did someone have to die, but they died in the most gruesome manner. Mocked and spat on as he carried his cross through the dusty streets of Jerusalem. It always happens, sorry. To face death by professional killers who knew how to make it last. We can probably have some idea of what it was like in our heads, maybe in some films, but I don't think we do. I don't think we can experience the heat and the dust and the sounds and the smells. John 1930 tells us that Jesus said, It is finished. It's the Greek word tetelesti. It means paid in full or completed. This signified that his mission to redeem humanity was complete. The penalty for sins was fully paid. Old Testament prophecies and sacrificial laws were fulfilled. Romans 10 9. Romans 10 9 and 10 says, If you declare with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and it justified, it is with your mouth that you profess that you are saved. Ephesians 2, 8 and 9. God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can't take credit for this. It is a gift from God. Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so that no one can boast about it. There's some of my favourite verses in the Bible because of the clarity and the power of what it is. Jesus died for you, and this is how you get to him. And it's not anything we had. It's abundantly clear. Salvation comes from Jesus alone. As Neil often says, in fact, some of the worksworth lot won't know this yet. Neil often says in Matlock, it's Jesus plus nothing. It's Jesus plus nothing. And what are we saying about the brutal, painful, embarrassing, heart-wretching death that Jesus went through if we're saying it's not enough? That we've got to add to it. That we've got to add bits, that we can lose it. If we could lose our salvation, we would. I definitely would. I'd have lost it today. With other stuff that I did earlier. We don't look back on Jesus' sacrifice. We look back on it with gratitude, with humility. It brings us to a place of repentance. Tim Hughes says repentance is what happens when we realise that we are shipwrecked without God. Repentance is when we're in the beauty of God's presence. We are suddenly aware of our selfishness, our greed, our pride. And suddenly we feel this deep conviction that Jesus is first and holy. The highest point in our lives. He's our centre, he's our foundation. And everything that gets in the way is removed. Repentance leads us into liberation, into freedom. But I know what some of you might be thinking. What about the verses that talk about faith and works? Neil's going to talk about those. James say, James say faith without works is dead. Right? That's what James says. It does. But our works are an overflow of our faith. That's how it works. It's not about doing more works, it's about having more faith. And that's, for me, what continually brings us back to the cross in the first place. Jesus fulfilled the ceremonial law. We no longer have to buy dubs or sacrificial lambs. My brother-in-law keeps sheep, actually, so I'll be alright, but I'd pretty I reckon I'll get through them pretty quickly. He'd be fuming. Jesus threw, it's one of my favourite lines. I got it. We saw Pete Greg at Gastry, didn't we? It's one of my favourite lines. Jesus threw a holy shit. I didn't say it. A Holy Spirit-shaped grenade into the world. Jesus threw a Holy Spirit shaped grenade into the world and turned everything on its head. I love that line. He said, You heard it said an eye for an eye. I say, if someone slaps you, show them the other cheek. Love your enemies. It's easy to love those who you already love, who already love you. And Jesus didn't come to abolish the moral law. Theft, adultery, murder. In fact, he adds to it. So the Pharisees and the religious leaders took everything incredibly literally. Do not murder, done. Do not murder is easy. I don't think I've ever murdered. But Jesus says if you have anger or hatred or contempt for someone, you've already committed murder in your heart. I reckon I've murdered twice this week. Not telling you who. He says, go and make disciples of all nations. He says, love your neighbour as yourself. He says, feed the poor. He says, rejoice when you're persecuted. Forgive everyone who sins against you. Those doves and sheep don't look so bad now, do they? Because actually Jesus brings us more commands, more challenges. I do wonder, actually, if the Pharisees from that time, what they would choose. This is a genuine question. Will they choose to keep the sacrifices? The lambs? Or will they choose to forgive everyone? Because in some ways, the forgiving everyone is much harder than sacrificing a lamb. And those are our works. We will be known by our fruits, and it's not easy, and we fail every single day, and that brings us back to the cross as well. And it goes full circle because we're forgiven. We live a life of attempting this journey to become more Christ-like every single day. And we won't get there until we're in glory in heaven. I love it. I love it. So I wouldn't choose the doves and the sacrificial lambs because I'd run out of lambs. I would choose to try and forgive. I would choose to try and love my enemy. I would choose to try and do that, knowing genuinely that I will fail at that most days, but knowing Jesus and the power of the Holy Spirit lives in me, and I keep trying every day, and I keep going back to the cross. To be humbled and to repent and to know the joy that came from that. It's so good. Yes, there should be works, but it's faith with works. Works come out of faith. Faith is very different to belief. Do you know who believes in Jesus more than anyone? The devil. The devil would never deny Jesus' existence. The devil would never deny that he was the Son of God or that he was raised from the dead. Fairly confident, and I'm going to put my hat on the line here, that he's not in heaven. And he's never going to be there. So it's not belief, it's faith. We don't need to grow our works, we need to grow our faith. There are works to do, it's not a list of rules. Religion says do more. Do this, do that. That's the way to please God. Jesus says it's done. Religion says do, Jesus says don't. We can't add to our salvation. But we can grow our faith. And from our faith, you get the outward showing of who it is that we are. How do we grow our faith? This. We come on a Sunday morning and we lift our hearts and we learn and we have community together. We do it at home groups. If you're not part of a home group, please contact one of us. Let us know. If you want to start one, even better. We read our Bible. Our faith grows because of God's living word. It's so good. And it's so simple. I love the gospel message. I think it's just it's the most beautifully simple story ever given to mankind, and it's the most complex because of what it entails, what Jesus had to go through in order for us to be free. I love it. I love how simply it can be poor. You know, the fundamentals of Christianity are, you know, God created everything, mankind fell into sin, Jesus died for our sins, and the only way to heaven is through him. That's it, that's it. That's all we believe. That's what we believe. Because that's everything. And somehow we mess it all up along the way and we try and do stuff. We can get a bit religious. Religion says do, Jesus says done. I love that line. I don't know who I stole it from, but definitely it's not something I would think of. And we grow our faith by coming, by worshiping, by reading, by praying. He is everything in our lives. If you don't know him, I look around the room, I don't know who I'm fairly confident. We're in a room of saved believers, right? But if you don't know him, open your heart. Open your heart because he's rescued us for eternity. And I don't know what hell looks like. I'm doing a different preacher, by the way. I don't know what Joe's preaching on hell. We don't know what hell looks like. We don't know. What I know is it's an eternity separated from God.

SPEAKER_00 15:31

No thank you.

SPEAKER_01 15:32

No thank you indeed. Yeah, I don't want that. I don't want a day separated from God. And as Neil says, and he's done this before, you know, we wake up in the morning and we have access to Jesus every single day. You know, the religious leaders and the Pharisees didn't have access to their God. It was through rituals and sacrifices and burnt offerings. We have a direct relationship with Jesus and the power of the Holy Spirit every single day. It's us that chooses not to take it. It's us that says, I can do that without you. Or I've managed that fine, so I'll do that again by myself. And time and time again we end up going back to Jesus in the first place and saying, Can you help with this? We know that. But we're human and stupid. It's not our works, and it will never be our works. But don't forget that Jesus did give us some big commands to do in our lives. Big commands. Hands up if you go and tell everyone about Jesus, every encounter that you have. There's not many hands, that's weird. I don't. Hands up if you forgive everyone. Yeah, no, I don't do that either. Hands up if you're wronged, the first thing you would do is turn the other cheek. Show them the other cheek. Yeah, I don't do that either. But it goes back to the cross. Time and time again. In the hope that tomorrow we try to turn the other cheek. And the following day we try to forgive. And the day after that we try and and it keeps going. He doesn't want us to keep failing, but he knows we will, and that's the entire point of a saviour in the first place. He knows we'll keep failing. But we need to join together, come together at times like this, in worship, in God's word, in community groups, to grow our faith. Because from our faith, the light will shine out of us. Someone gave that word this morning, didn't they? About the light shining out of us in the prayer meeting. It doesn't matter, but yes, that. It needs to become irresistible to the world. We should be so anti the world, which is quite complex, isn't it? Because we live in it. Someone described what it might be actually. Now that we're we're kind of familiar with church now, but for some people we've walking into church is quite a quite a thing. I don't know if you've ever been to a um a bookies. Um and if you haven't, it's actually really overwhelming. There's all sorts of numbers and figures and stuff going on and people and back in my day, cigarettes, and it was all sorts. And actually, walking into a bookie's is as obscure for some people as walking into a church. But we need to show them differently. We need to show them that actually it's not like that. We're no longer bound by rules and laws and rituals and sacrifices and traditions. There is only one reason we come here on a Sunday morning, and it is Jesus. That's the only reason we're here. Together. Most of you wouldn't be friends with. Again, I'm not naming who. Absolutely. In what world do these people come together to celebrate one God? To celebrate our Lord Jesus, to come back to Him in worship, to come back to Him in prayer, to learn about His Word, to know who He is and to understand. And I love it. And I'm privileged to give the gospel message because it is the most powerful story that's ever been given to mankind. Anyone ever questions that it's works over faith or that it's both hand in hand, they're wrong. It's salvation through Jesus alone, and it always will be. Ask the thief on the cross when you get there. Ah Lord, we thank you. The song Amazing Grace has just kind of come into my head, Lord. Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me. Like us. Lord, we were all wretches, far removed from your glory. And there's only one thing that saves us, there's only one person that saves us, and it's Jesus. And it only ever will be that. Lord, we thank you that Jesus came. Our heart breaks for the death that you took on that cross so that my sin and my shame and my regret and my fear was pinned to it for eternity. That I can now live in freedom, Lord. Lord, I long to do more. But I want to be built up by your faith. We want to be built up by your faith. Lord, may we be the light in this community in every action that we do, every interaction that we have. We long to see more lives saved, Lord. Use us. But we are nothing without coming back to you and coming back to the cross. Lord, we will be eternally grateful. Quite literally, eternally grateful for everything you've done for us. Amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me. We lift our voices, our souls, and our hearts to you this morning and say, Praise you, Lord Jesus. Amen. Amen.

SPEAKER_00 21:08

Wow.