Roman Road

Last week I mentioned that John Pirtle had lead me down the Roman Road. Some people have asked what that is so I have included a version of the Roman Road from www.theromanroad.org website. 

"For whoever will call on the name of the Lord will be saved." 
                                                    - Romans 10:13

How You Can Know God's Love

"There is a God in Heaven who loves you as you are and not as you should be."

Yes... you are right... there is a God. You know that must be true. The heart of
the human being longs for God, and logic demands divine existence.

While everyone believes God is... most sense separation from God. We
know God must be holy and good. We see ourselves as unholy and not good.
We conclude that God is angry with us and we cannot know Him.

Good News! This Testament of God's love is His Word to tell us that He loves
us as we are. That love will save us from our sin and make us what we should
be as God's children.


John 3:16
"For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that
whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life."

We hear Jesus say, "God so loved the world." God's love has no limitations.
He loves "so". More than we can imagine. He loves everyone - not just
some ones.

Romans 5:8 tells us that God loved us so that "when we were in our sin
Christ Jesus came to die for us."


Romans 3:23
"for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,"

This verse tells us that all people have sinned. We have fallen short of
God's intended purpose for us. God made us to know Him.... to receive His
love and to love him in return.

For love to be love... for God to be God... and for humans to be humans....
God gave us a choice. We can choose to love ourselves and turn to our
selfish pursuits. That is sin. In our sin we cannot know God and His love.
The result of sin is that we are lost... separated from God.

Romans 6:23
"For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in
Christ Jesus our Lord."

Wages are just payment... due reward... what one has coming because of
labor. The just payment for our sin is death.

Death here means spiritual insensitivity. When we are still in our sin, we
have no life with God. We are alive physically but dead spiritually. If we
continue in that condition, we will be separated from God for all eternity.

The wages of sin is death. but God's free gift is eternal life. While wages
are earned, a gift is offered... no strings attached. God says He will give us
eternal life - life with Him - in the place of sin's payment of death.

How can God remain true to His holiness and forgive unholy sinners?
Because Jesus, His Son, has paid the price for sin by His death on the cross.

Second Corinthians 5:21 says, "He who knew no sin became sin for us, that
we may be made the righteousness of God through Him."

Jesus arose from the grave to conquer sin and death for all who receive Him
as God's free gift.

How can you receive God's free gift of love and life?

Romans 10:9-10
"that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart
that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a
person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he
confesses, resulting in salvation."

A person receives God's free gift of love and life by placing faith in Jesus
Christ. To believe is simply to take God at His word. With our heart
(whole believing) we believe that Jesus is God's Son who died for our sin
on the cross and arose from the grave to live in us as Savior and Lord.

To believe in Jesus will result in confessing that faith with one's mouth.

Do you acknowledge that your are a sinner?

Do you believe by faith that Jesus, God's Son, died for your sin on the cross?

Will you now confess Him as your Savior and Lord?

Romans 10:13
"for Whoever will call on the name of the Lord will be saved."


This verse says that any person who will call upon the name of Jesus,
the Lord, shall be saved.

To call means simply to ask in prayer. The verse does not require one to
know more... do better... clean up one's life... or in any way try to add to
what Jesus has done for us.

Will you now call upon Jesus to save you from your sin so that you
can know God's love and forgiveness?

Pray like this: "Dear God, I confess that I am a sinner, and I am sorry. I need
a Savior. I know I cannot save myself. I believe by faith that Jesus, your
Son, died on the cross to be my Savior. I believe He arose from the grave
to live as my Lord. I turn from my sin. I ask You, Lord Jesus, to forgive my
sin and come into my heart. I trust you as my Savior and receive you as
my Lord. Thank you, Jesus, for saving me."

When anyone calls on the Lord in this manner, that one is saved according
to God's Word. If you pray a prayer of repentance and faith, you are saved.
You have God's word on it.

If you have prayed this prayer to receive Christ as your Lord and Savoir, why
not record your decision to follow Jesus as follows. Often times, a good place
to write this would be inside the cover of your bible:

Believing by faith that God loves me and sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to die
for my sin and arise from the grave to live in me, I, _______, do this day,
 ________, repent of my sin and accept Jesus Christ as my personal Lord
and Savior. According to the promise of God in Romans 10:13, I have
called upon His name and have His word for the assurance of my salvation. 


Do you need to speak to someone about questions you may have? If so, contact Need Him Ministries at 1-888-NEEDHIM (1-888-633-3446). To view the Need Him Channel at YouTube visit us online.

What’s your story?

     Every Christian has a story of how they came to Christ. The blind man that we read about in the new testament told his story” All I know is that once I was blind, but now I see.”  Your story is different from my story, even if you were a child you can still remember what it was like to give yourself to Christ.

      For me my story is always the same, I chased a girl into a Church and God caught me. I was not looking for God; God was the last thing that I wanted. To tell the truth I only went to shut her up. “I want you to come to church with me.” “Why won’t you come to church with me?” “It’s only an hour.” “Alright already, I’ll go!”

     That first service was not too bad I guess. Dr. Lee was preaching that day and to my ear he was a pretty good speaker. He punctuated his one point per line.  He kept good eye contact with the audience. It was a good speech even if I didn’t know what he was talking about. Shoot, if this was all there was to it I could handle going every once in a while. After all it kept her off my back, she wasn’t asking me to stop drinking and we could keep on fooling around. My life did not have to change that much. All it cost me was an hour a week and I was nursing a hangover through most of it anyway.

     I guess it was a few weeks before anything started happening.  By then we were going to her mother’s Sunday school class with her. Yes she had upped the ante on me, we were going two hours a week but it was mostly pleasant, except every one of those people wanted to convert the poor little lost boy.  Help came from an unlikely source. The Sunday school teacher was John Pirtle. He always seemed to know when I was being pursued by another one of those elderly would be evangelists. He would swoop in and rescue me. He became a pretty good friend of mine.      

     Something was starting to happen though. Little by little I started to have questions. Things were happening, things that I didn’t have an answer for. I felt drawn but I did not know towards what. All I knew was that I had to talk to somebody. Week after week I ended Sunday school with the conviction that I had to talk to John.  “I have to talk to John; I’ve got to talk to John! I don’t know what’s going on but I have to talk to John!”  It did not take long before my girlfriend got tired of the incessant chant.  “Do you want me to ask John for his number for you?”   “Huh?” “That would be a great idea!”   We found out later that at the same time she was asking me, John was across the class room asking her Mother if it was ok for him to call me.

     It took me two days to get up the nerve to call him but that nagging sensation remained.  I did not even let him talk, as soon as he got on the phone I blurted out, “John, I got all of these questions and I don’t know what’s going on.” John waited patiently while I peeled off question after question. At the end I asked,” So do you have any answers?” John said that he thought that he did have an answer.  John led me down the Roman Road of Salvation. After he finished he asked, “Did that answer your questions?”  “Yes,” I replied almost inaudibly.   But you know what?  He did not answer a single one of my questions.  But he did answer a question I did not realize I needed to ask and that one question answered everything.

     John asked me if I wanted for him to pray with me to receive Christ. My heart was still full of pride and I answered that I would do it on my own. My mother had taught us how to pray as children so that night I prayed the only way that I knew how. I lowered myself at the side of my bed; hands steepled tucked under the point of my chin and prayed one of the most pitiful prayers that I have ever prayed in my life. You know what?   As bad as that prayer was, God still accepted it and me. He paid my debt and welcomed me home.

     In most families there is a tradition of telling the story of how our parents first met. At other times we can bore our families and colleagues to death over the details of our kid’s first steps, first words, and first recitals. The one story that we need to tell the most is the story of how we came to know Christ. That one story is the one that we need to share with anyone who will listen, anyone who needs to know Jesus Christ.

Crossing the Rubicon

     “What are you prepared to do?”  Sean Connery’s, Jimmy Malone gasps his dying words to Elliot Ness in Brian De Palmas 1987 Film “The Untouchables.”  That line is the defining statement of the movie. It is often the defining statement of our lives. It is at least the one we play over and over.  How far do we go? Where is that Bridge too far?

     In 49 BC a young Commander Julius stood overlooking the boundary of the Roman Empire. The Senate declared that, under the penalty of death, no legion was to enter into Rome. Many commanders disbanded their armies so that their men could return home. 

     In January of 49 Julius led his legion over the Rubicon River entering into the Roman imperium. Julius and his men were deemed outlaws with a death sentence hanging over their heads. He was said to have uttered the words,” the die is cast” at the time of the crossing.  He had gone beyond the point of no return.

     For Julius the decision to cross over the Rubicon would prove to be a historic one.  The imperium of Rome and many of the Senators fled at the coming of Julius and his legion. The beginning of the Caesar’s civil war would start at his willingness to breach the established law, and would end with Julius named Caesar.   

     Jesus asks in Luke chapter 14 what man who is building a tower does not sit down first and count the cost of what the tower will cost to build. What King who is going into battle does not figure out if his army of ten thousand men can defeat his opponent with an army of twenty thousand.

     We can go through our whole lives and not have to make that kind of decision. We do not often face those kinds of odds. Most of the things that we come across don’t require us to wager our lives. We do not face life or death situations.

     If we are going to follow Christ there is a Cost. Most of us have traveled up to the line over and over. We toy with the idea but never commit.  If you are going to be a follower of Christ you will have a high price to pay. Jesus says to follow him is to hate Father and Mother, to hate our own lives. He says that we are to pick up our cross and follow him. Nothing is to be dearer to us than he is.

     Not everyone who is being called by Jesus can pay the cost of following him. For some the price is just too high. They cannot bear to part with this world or the things in it. They never realize that one day everything that they fought so hard for will be forfeited. One day all of our trophies will be trashed. The price they pay is higher than they thought it would be.

     Christ may never ask us to get rid of all that we have. We may never have to put our lives on the line to follow Christ. Christ does tell us to count the cost though. He is looking for the willing heart that is willing to place him before everything else; a willingness to die to self, a willingness to place ourselves into submission even to the point of Crucifixion. Salvation is not for the faint of heart. It is an all or none proposition. We have to cross the point of no return. It is not a matter of life and death…It’s more important than that.

Mine!

     For anyone who is around children it does not take long for you to hear three little words, “That’s not fair!” Just try to split anything up between two children and they will fight all day over who got the bigger piece. They will fight even if the difference is only a millimeter.

      As adults we think that we are above this yet our actions tell another story.  We feel as if we are entitled to anything that we want. We will positively snarl at anyone who gets close to anything that we think is ours.

     In the Church, where we are supposed to be above it all, yet we are little better. We hold grudges over things that don’t matter anymore, if they ever did. Congregations have split over the color of the cushions in the pews.  Don’t let anyone cross us, or we will whine that we are not getting our rights.

     The great preacher from another era Harry Ironsides told a story about a church meeting that he had attended when he was a child. Harry said that he had gone to the church one night with his mother. Harry said that it was not uncommon for him to accompany his mother to church but that this night was not a night that they usually went to church.

     Young Harry sat quietly in the pew next to his mother listening as the adults argued bitterly.  After a while a young man stood up and demanded, “I don’t care about the rest of you I just want my rights!” The congregation was momentarily silenced by the outburst. An Old Irishman who had been sitting at the back of the hall filled the silence by asking, “Your rights? Did you say your rights Lad?” A little softer the young man replied,” That’s right, I want my rights! I want them and I’ll have them!”  Sadly the Old Irishman answered him,” The Lord Jesus did not come for your rights son; He came for your wrongs!” Dejectedly the young man slowly sat down saying,” Your right, your right.”

     How long will it take us to realize that we are held to a higher standard?  How long will it take us to remember that we have to hold everything loosely, that they are temporal, that we can’t take them with us? How long till our actions match our identity in Christ?  

     Jesus gives us a good glimpse of how we are to live our lives. In the Gospel of Luke; Jesus asks his disciples a question that puts thing into perspective. Jesus asks, "Suppose one of you had a servant plowing or looking after the sheep. Would he say to the servant when he comes in from the field, 'Come along now and sit down to eat'? Would he not rather say, 'Prepare my supper, get yourself ready and wait on me while I eat and drink; after that you may eat and drink'? Would he thank the servant because he did what he was told to do? So you also, when you have done everything you were told to do, should say, 'We are unworthy servants; we have only done our duty.' “Luke 17:7-10

     When did we forget that we are not our own? Were we not bought at a price? If this were all that it is, maybe, just maybe there would be a reason to say that things are not fair. If it were all, maybe we would be justified in demanding our rights. That time has passed however. When Christ came to us we gave up those rights to follow him. We are only doing our duty.