do that I may inherit eternal life?” The question of the young man is leisurely; the question of the jailer is hurried, under the feeling that there is not a moment to be lost. Helpless and hopeless, he wants but one thing, and that is to be “saved.” Of course his “What must I do?” indicates that he is willing and ready to comply with any possible terms; yet it is not a question of conscious strength—it is rather the question of despair.

Such a question shows that a great point—an essential point—had been gained. The gospel is a sovereign remedy designed and constructed to meet a desperate case. Not only do they that are whole stand in no need of a physician, but wherever there lingers an idea of spiritual strength, or a dream, of self-righteousness, the condition necessary for the reception of such a salvation as that which the gospel proclaims is entirely wanting. Christ is an exclusive Saviour, and “looking to Him” is an exclusive hope.

“What must I do to be saved?” Clear, quick, unhesitating, comes the answer of Paul: “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.” Both the question and the answer strike the point—the centre of the soul’s supreme need, and the centre of the gospel message.

This answer of Paul’s is not simply his own. It is the answer of God to every man who wants to know how he can be saved. It is the answer of the whole Bible. It is the pre-eminently, distinctively Christian answer. All revelation has one great object—Jesus Christ, promised, announced, expected, seen by faith beforehand; then Jesus Christ actually come, His life told, His mission developed, Himself presented to the world as the one and only Name whereby men can be saved;—always Jesus Christ. Patriarchs and prophets, Moses and David, Christ Himself, His apostles and disciples after Him, the whole Church—all unite to say to the awakened soul: “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.”

But this answer, though not Paul’s alone, is nevertheless his in such a sense that an immense weight belongs to it. What does Paul himself understand by it? We know something of his experience, and that will tell us the meaning of these words as spoken by him. He spake that which he knew, and testified that which he had seen. He felt that he could offer to the spiritual need of every man that which had so fully met his own.

Read Paul’s life. Read his epistles. You see at a glance what Christ was to him—a Redeemer. And what to him was the very centre of Christian truth? “Christ crucified.” He had been so roused as to see clearly the relation between himself and God. The true sense of sin had been awakened within him. No man had made more strenuous efforts to obtain justification by the works of the law than he had; and no man had more deeply realised his helplessness. How does he describe the struggle? “I had not known sin, but by the law.... When the commandment came, sin revived, and I died.... Sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it slew me.... That which I do I allow not: for what I would, that do I not; but what I hate, that do I.... I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) there dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not. For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.... O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?”

“I thank God, through Jesus Christ our Lord.”

We all know how God arrested, overcame, and subdued him, by showing him in that same “Jesus Christ our Lord” the mystery of the Divine love. God taught him that he must no longer expect righteousness and eternal life to come from his own works, to be wrought by his own strength. Eternal life is the free gift of God. Look to the cross! Listen to the Spirit! Learn in “the folly of the cross” to adore the wisdom and the power of God—a forgiveness that glorifies justice as well as mercy; a forgiveness that kills sin as well as removes its penalty; a salvation that harmonises man with God as well as forgives him; a salvation that implies a perfect holiness, the motive being love, and the effectual power being that of the Holy Spirit. Deep as his want had been, it was now completely met by the revelation of the Saviour. To that revelation his response was prompt, complete, irrevocable. He says that it was as though scales had fallen from his eyes, this disclosure of the Divine plan of salvation to his mind. It was full of light, full of mercy. The manifestation of the risen Christ was the instrumentality which enlightened him. He saw straightway the nature and purpose of “the cross,” the certainty of justification through faith, the believer’s completeness in Christ. “Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.” “There is now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.” “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God.” The natural result of these convictions in the apostle’s own case was his consecration to the Saviour. Bought with a great price, he felt that he was no longer his own, but that, in life and death, he belonged to Him who had given Himself for him. In Christ he had found peace for his conscience, light for his mind, love for his heart. And what was the secret of it all? Simply “believing in the Lord Jesus Christ.”

This, then, was Paul’s gospel to the jailer, and there is no other gospel to-day. We know that sin incurs condemnation—the displeasure of God. The universal conscience gives testimony to that fact. We know that man cannot, in his own person, satisfy the claims of the Divine law. But there comes down to us the old truth that Christ is “the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world.” He “finished the work which His Father gave Him to do,” and the whole benefit of that work is given to faith.

It is in the name of this perfect system of truth—which, observe, is a perfect series of facts—consecrated by the trial of ages, by the experience of an incalculable number of souls in all times, places, and conditions, and by the world’s own verdict on Christian character wherever it is found—that we speak to you with a confidence equal to that with which Paul spoke to the jailer. And let me add that we so speak because we have made the experience of it our own, and that it is as sure in our hearts as our very existence. Yes, a perfect series of facts as well as a perfect system of truth. Men sometimes object that we put before them hard and abstruse systems of theology, and that we condemn them for not believing things which they cannot understand. There is no need to do anything of the kind, and when it is done a grave mistake is committed. I preach no “abstractions” to you when I urge you to faith in Christ for salvation. I deal with facts and their deductions—deductions which are as inevitable as