Previous Challenge Entry (Level 4 – Masters)
Topic: How to be Saved (07/02/26)
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TITLE: You MUST Be Born Again | Previous Challenge Entry
By Doug Laird
07/05/26 -
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The process involves making a one-time decision to believe, after first reaching the age or stage of moral accountability, and then being presented with the unadulterated Gospel Message, encapsulated in John 3: 16,18.
[I believe that persons who do reach the age or stage of moral accountability, or are not presented with the unadulterated Gospel Message, are judged by their response to whatever knowledge of God they were exposed to, beginning with the concept of eternity that God places in every soul that He creates (Eccl.3: 11).]
Q. So where did the Matt. 7: 13 majority go wrong?
A. By adding the additional “requirements” that religious, often well-intending, but misguided, leadership has come up throughout the course of the Church Age.
Maintaining the profound, but simplicity of the unadulterated Gospel Message has been an ongoing struggle since the very beginning of the Church Age (See Galatians).
The first challenge was the belief that male Gentile converts had to be circumcised in order to “really” be saved.
This controversy was successfully resolved (1Cor. 7: 18, 190, but the list of other “additional” requirements that would come along and be promoted as necessary, would go on and on throughout the course of the Church Age.
Jesus warned that this was going to happen (Matt. 24: 11).
1Tim. 4:1 tells us that this will only get worse as the dispensation of the Church Age comes to its end.
Paul referred to this as being the work of demons (Gal. 3: 1).
Just as marital adultery involves going to a third party to fulfill one’s perceived needs or desires for sexuality, spiritual adultery involves going to a third party (Man-made religion) for one’s perceived needs or objectives in the spiritual realm.
The perceived need to do anything beyond believing, that is to place one’s full trust and confidence in the Person and the Work of the Lord Jesus Christ, is evidence of one’s lack of faith in the efficacy of the Work that Jesus finished (John 19: 30) on the cross.
The adulterated Gospel Message has been compromised by having added to it the additional requirements of Man. The unadulterated Gospel Message has not.
Which ONE have you chosen as the means to secure eternal life?
The issue of what it takes to be saved is further clouded by a misunderstanding of what the purpose is of the post (after) salvation spiritual life.
One can never be any more or any less saved than one became the moment one was born again (John 5: 24/Rom.8:1).
Attending worship services (or otherwise connecting with a local pulpit), water baptisms, celebrating the Lord Supper (Communion), confession of ongoing sin, study and application of the Word of God, prayer, singing hymns, conforming to the likeness of Christ, identifying and applying one’s spiritual gift and accompanying ministry, and participating in the Great Commission, can ALL have a place , a part, and a purpose in the POST salvation spiritual life.
Each one could be an edifying Bible study, but for the purpose of this article, one only needs to acknowledge that ALL of these things are post salvation activities, and therefore are not the means to either obtain or retain salvation.
The matter of one’s salvation has already been resolved.
For example, water baptism ceremonies can afford an already born-again believer the opportunity to make a public statement of his or her faith, but this must not be confused with the identifying-baptism that it is the sealing Work of God the Holy Spirit (Eph. 4: 30/1Cor.12: 13) that takes place at the moment of salvation.
Born-again believers who take part in water baptism ceremonies had already passed from death to life the moment they first believed (John 5 :24].
By raising doubts in the minds of weak (unedified) believers, the devil can open the door to all of the false, alternative, Man-made, additional requirements for salvation that are promoted by the religious community.
They are designed to encourage the mistaken need to “do something” more, to either obtain or to retain salvation.
As seemingly simple as the Biblical process of securing salvation may be, (John 3: 16), one will not reside in Heaven with
out having participated in it.
“Marvel not that I say unto you, You MUST be born again (John 3: 7 NASB2020).”
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