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                    ||                       How beautiful on the mountains
                    ||                       are the feet of those ... who
                    ||                       proclaim salvation, who say to
                                             Zion, "Your God reigns!"
          Pastor RALPH & GENE ANN WOOD                  --Isaiah 52:7 (NIV)
          E-mail:  randg.wood@encode.com
          FRESH MANNA, 13/05/1998 ........................... ACTS 16:29-34
          {29} Then he ... said, Sirs, what must I do to be saved?  {31}
          And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt
          be saved, and thy house.  {32} And they spake unto him the word
          of the Lord, and to all that were in his house. {33} And he ...
          was baptized, he and all his, straightway. {34} And when he had
          brought them into his house, he ... rejoiced, believing in God
          with all his house.   --ACTS 16:29-34 (KJV)
             Two key questions which every church or denomination must ask
          are, "What does a person have to do, to qualify to be baptized?",
          and the corollary question, "How old does a person have to be?".
          Over the centuries, churches have given different answers.  This
          passage shows what answer the New Testament Church gave.
             The practise of Paul and Silas, here, goes back to two sayings
          of the risen Christ in two parts of the Great Commission.  For He
          said, "The one WHO BELIEVES and is baptized will be saved"; and
          "Make disciples ..., baptizing them ..., TEACHING THEM to observe
          -everything- I have commanded you" (see MARK 16:15-18, & MATTHEW
          28:18-20).  And when the jailer at Philippi asked Paul and Silas,
          "What must I do to be saved", they answered that he and his house
          would be saved if they would "BELIEVE on the Lord Jesus Christ".
          And right then, in the middle of the night, "They SPAKE THE WORD
          of the Lord" to him and all those in his household.
             To be sure, the jailer's actions and his question had already
          showed that he had come under conviction of sin; implied that he
          was confessing himself to be a lost sinner in need of salvation;
          revealed that he was ready to repent and change all his ways; and
          petitioned Paul and Silas to explain the gospel message to him.
          He had made the first four of "The Steps Of Salvation".  So, Paul
          and Silas jumped to the heart of the gospel.  First, BELIEVE ON
          Jesus.  In the book of Acts, and the New Testament, this can only
          mean, "Believe on Jesus as your Saviour".  But more, the apostles
          said, "Believe on THE LORD Jesus".  Again, in its context, this
          clearly means, "Accept Jesus Christ as Lord of your life".  This
          is how the jailer and all his household qualified to be baptized.
             How old would all those in this household be?  Old enough to:
          (1) hear and understand a sermon in the middle of the night; (2)
          believe on Jesus as Saviour and confess Him as Lord [see ROMANS
          10:9-10]; & (3) rejoice that they had "believed in God".   --RLW
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