What must I do to be saved?

At Caesarea there was a man named Cornelius, a centurion in what was known as the Italian Regiment. He and all is family were devout and God-fearing; he gave generously to those who were in need and prayed to God regularly. One day about three in the afternoon he had a vision... Acts 10:1-3

I do like Cornelius.

To get the full story you need to read Acts 10 right through. Summing it up very briefly... 

Cornelius, a Roman centurion, has a dramatic vision. He is told by an angel to send for a man called Simon Peter - who has also received a vision to assure him that it’s all right to go and visit Cornelius, even though he is a Gentile.

Peter comes and tells Cornelius about Jesus - whereupon the Holy Spirit falls on him, his friends and family. They speak in tongues, and are baptised in water. 

The full works! A mini-Pentecost! A wonderful experience for all those involved - but also a turning-point in the life of the growing church. If a Gentile Roman soldier can be saved, why not anybody? As Peter himself had preached on the Day of Pentecost: “...anyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved” (Acts 2:21).

A great word, saved. But it can be misused. I know someone who has a habit of pronouncing very definitely on whether or not a particular person is saved. “He’s a nice person,” she might say, “but he isn’t saved”.

What she means, I think, is either (a) that he hasn’t put his trust explicitly in Christ, or (b) that he claims to have done so, but doesn’t really believe the right things. Whatever, he isn’t saved.

This makes me feel uncomfortable. 

Who are we to pronounce so definitely on who is or isn’t saved? Isn’t this something that, ultimately, God alone knows? Let’s face it, we’ve all known people who seemed for many years to be as saved as you could imagine - but then, sadly, turned out to be anything but. And anyway, isn’t there a slightly ugly hint of judging others in talking like that? 

What about Cornelius? At what point precisely was he “saved”? Acts 10 ends with him filled with the Spirit and baptised in water. No doubt there, then - he was saved, all right!

But go back to what was said about him at the beginning of the chapter. He was “devout” and “God-fearing”. He “gave generously” to the poor and “prayed regularly” (verse 3). The angel who visits him tells him that “your prayers and gifts to the poor have come up as a memorial offering before God” (verse 4).

If those words mean anything, they mean - surely - that even at this point in his life, Cornelius was a man of God. God knew him; God heard his prayers; God recognised his good deeds. But he had not yet believed in Jesus because he hadn’t heard the gospel. Was he, then, not saved? 

Suppose (if I may put it this way) he had popped out for a loaf of bread an hour before Peter turned up to tell him about Jesus, got run over by a chariot and been killed, would he then have been eternally lost? That would certainly seem rather strange.

You may very well say, “But that couldn’t have happened! God had it all in hand.” And of course you’re right. But - well, you get the point. It almost seems as if the coming of Peter to make Christ known explicitly was basically a matter of dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s.

In general, the idea of being saved simply isn’t as cut-and-dried, as black-and-white, as my friend suggests by her remarks. 

Certainly, the New Testament does speak of it as a past, completed event. In Ephesians 2:5 and 8, for example, Paul tells his readers that “by grace you have been saved” - something already enjoyed, something to rejoice in. But in Romans 5:9-10 he speaks of the certainty that we “will be saved” - emphasising the future aspect, the fact that there remains so much more to look forward to.

In other words, salvation is sometimes viewed as an event, an experience, at other times as a process, a journey. And as people progress along that journey it is indeed God alone who knows at what point the word “saved” can be applied to them. 

I wonder how many Corneliuses there are in our lives? 

Salvation is through Christ alone - no ifs or buts there. But I just wonder if, when we get to heaven, we may be in for a surprise or two. Will there be people we meet to whom we feel like saying (though, of course, we won’t, because our manners will be perfect then), “Fancy seeing you here!” Perhaps so. 

(And who knows? - perhaps they will look back at us and say “Fancy seeing you here...”)

Lord Jesus, thank you for your gift of salvation. Please help me to live as someone who has been saved in the past, is being saved in the present, and will be saved in the future. Amen.