For whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved

Sermon notes from Sunday 24 February 2019 pm

“For whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved.” Verse 13

This is the very foundation on which the gospel we preach rests.  You have the potential, the qualifications to call on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.  Paul is describing the righteousness of the Lord here. The Jews were seeking their own righteousness – “all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags before the Lord.” Isaiah 64 verse 6

A call out of the deep.  This is where this call must come from – the very depths of a man or woman’s soul.  The persons that are pointed to in this text – “for whosoever”.  If you were to call tonight you would be saved, you would know your sins forgiven, that those sins have been cast into the sea of forgetfulness.  This text assures me that there is none outside of God’s love or provision.  The only exclusion is you yourself.  You can exclude yourself by not calling on the name of the Lord.  As Jesus made his way out through the dusty roads of Jericho he met a man begging by the roadside.  That is all he did day after day.  The Lord happened to pass by that way.  This was no coincidence.  The Lord had to meet Bartimaeus that day.  It is no coincidence that you are here tonight.  The Lord has ordained it so.  The Lord wants to meet you.  The Lord draws you back into this meeting, shows you your need of salvation, shows you his wounds from Calvary so that you might be saved.  Jesus asked Bartimaeus “what would you have me to do for you.”  Bartimaeus turned to the Lord “that I might receive my sight.”  He knew the one who he was talking to was the God of heaven who could do more that he could ever ask or think.  If you were to call on his name tonight you will be saved, made a new creature in Christ Jesus.  Society thought of Bartimaeus as of no value to anyone but he was a lost soul to Christ.  God looks on you as a lost soul who needs to be saved.  Bartimaeus wasn’t outside the range.  See that invitation extended to the very palaces and elite – Acts 25 verse 23.  When Agrippa and Bernice with great pomp came to city commanded that Paul be brought before them.  Here was Agrippa being told of his great need of salvation, he came face to face with the gospel.

The plight of the soul.  When we are lost and undone, on the way to a Christless eternity it is only then we will lift our voices.  The heartfelt plea of the lost sinners state.  Paul was saying “when I stand on that day I do not want to stand on my own righteousness or merit but rather in the righteousness in faith alone.  Will you stand on your own good works?  Nathan came to David one day with a parable of a lamb being taken from a poor man to serve to a rich man’s visitor.  David was enraged and said that man should be punished.  Nathan told him that he was the man who had done this wrong.  In Psalm 51 we read “against thee and thee only have I sinned.”  David recognised and acknowledged his sin.  David felt the pangs in his heart, he knew he had done wrong before God.  Like the prodigal ling in the far country “I will arise and go to my father and say to him “I have sinned before heaven and you.”  He knew he had done wrong.

The plea that is made.  Blind Bartimaeus realised he had a need and the only way to have that need met was to cry out to the Lord.  There was no point in crying out to the disciples or the religious leaders because they couldn`t help him.  The only one who can save your soul is God himself.  It was this man’s plight that brought him to this call.  It was because of his blindness and his disability that brought him to this place because of his sin.

The promise of the text “shall be saved.”  You cannot get any better promise that that.  This is the God of heaven who gives the assurance.  If you feel your need tonight and you call on him you shall be saved.  Remember that conversation on Calvary’s hill.  On either side of Christ were 2 thieves.  For some reason one of the thieves told the other to be quiet.  He told him “we are here because of our guilt and shame, we are paying the penalty but this man has done nothing wrong.”  He looked at Christ and said “Lord remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom.”  The Lord turned to that old thief and told him “today thou shalt be with me in paradise.”  Have you ever really called on the name of the Lord?  Have you that assurance of sins forgiven?  Jesus has paid it all.  Who is our faith in today?  Is it in the finished work of Christ?  Come and receive Christ if you have never done so.  Salvation is from the Lord alone.