May 11, 2018 - Suggested Reading Acts 2 for the Mother’s Day message from Psalm 86 “save me, because I serve you just as my mother did”

"And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”

Acts 2:21 (NIV)

As the disciples were obediently praying and waiting for Christ Jesus to send what His heavenly Father promised (Lk 24:49), a sound of wind and what looked like fire came down upon all who were present in the room in Jerusalem. The Christians had begun to declare the wonders of God in foreign languages to the diverse crowd gathering to see what the noise was about, when Peter stood up and preached the first evangelical sermon ever preached. This was a tremendous sermon with a tremendous result of 3,000 souls saved through repentance, baptism and the receiving of the Holy Spirit. I want us to focus in on just this one sentence - "everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved”.  What God was declaring through Peter was that the world had entered a new age- the age of salvation - it was different from ages past and is the last age until the return of Christ as King and the establishment of the new heavens and earth. This age is marked by the lack of restrictions on those who want to enter the kingdom of heaven- all they need to do is call on the name of the Lord to be saved. Gender doesn’t matter, tribe doesn’t matter, wealth doesn’t matter, physical appearance doesn’t matter, language doesn’t matter, education doesn’t matter, as matter of record the only thing that matters is that you call on the name of the Lord to be saved. Almost 2,000 years have gone by since the world first heard this Good News and yet just a relative few of the large numbers of humans who have lived on earth during those 2,000 years have actually called on the name of Lord to be saved. Just a few. What makes those few different than the many? They knew that they needed salvation- they were poor in spirit, they knew their need of a Saviour - and so they called on the name of the Lord to be saved. Friend I hope that you are one of the few who are saved. What a glorious state to be in, to have the Spirit of the Living God present within you, as a deposit guaranteeing our glorious future. Friend if that is your glorious state- may I ask you a question?

Do you not need Him now to live this day to His glory?