Here's an interesting subject as well, and I don't want to go too deep on this, but I
think it's an important point to mention.
How about people, and pay close attention because I don't want to lose anybody because
I'm going to go a little deeper here.
How about people who were already saved when Jesus came on the scene?
Because here's the thing, people are saved in the Old Testament, right?
Okay, so what about people that are already saved and then John the Baptist comes on the
scene?
Jesus comes on the scene.
Did those people have to get re-saved?
No.
Of course not.
They had to get saved once.
So they were already saved.
The disciples didn't have to get re-saved when they met Jesus.
They were already saved.
That's why I even picked them.
They were saved before they'd ever even heard of Jesus because they're under the Old Testament
system, okay?
Now here's how this works because some people have put out a hypothetical, "Well, what if
somebody was saved in the Old Testament but then when Jesus came along they didn't believe
in him?"
You know, here's the thing.
That's impossible situation.
Here's why.
Because Jesus said, "My sheep hear my voice."
And they follow me.
Now that means that when Jesus came on the scene, Jesus comes into Israel and starts
preaching, okay?
There's three kinds of people that are out there.
There are people that are already saved, okay?
And those people, when they heard Jesus preach, they knew this is the voice of the shepherd.
This is the son of God.
And they believed in him.
Right?
But they were already saved.
And because they were saved, they believed in him, okay?
Then there's another kind of people.
People that were not saved, but when they heard Jesus preach, or when they heard John
the Baptist preach, they got saved, right?
John the Baptist, Jesus the Apostles got them saved.
And then there's a third group of people who were not saved.
They heard John the Baptist and Jesus preach, and they still didn't believe in him.
And they still didn't get saved, right?
Now let me give you an illustration to help you understand this concept.
Let's say I took the Bible and showed a saved person a passage of scripture that they've
never seen before.
Because most Christians have not read the whole Bible.
So if I took a saved Christian and I show them a passage of the Bible that they've never
seen before, and they point at it and say, "I don't believe that.
That's a lie."
You know what I'd say?
That person's not even saved.
I thought they were saved, but that person's not saved.
Because if I show a saved person a passage from the Bible, they're going to believe in
it every single time.
And if they don't believe in it, it's evidence that they weren't saved, right?
Because you know what?
He that is of God heareth God's words, ye therefore hear them not, because you're not
of God.
Okay.
So if I show a saved person the word of God, they'll believe it.
I'm not saying that they're going to necessarily have the same interpretation of something
that's complicated.
But I mean, if I just show them a clear scripture, it's just right there.
I mean, how many times have you had somebody point at the Bible and say, "I don't believe
that."
And what does that tell you?
Not saved.
Okay.
Well, it's the same thing.
You came along and started preaching and somebody that you thought was saved said, "I don't
believe this guy is the Messiah.
I don't believe this.
He's a false teacher."
What does that tell you?
He wasn't saved in the first place.
Okay.
So let me ask this.
Was Saul of Tarsus saved during the ministry of Jesus and Stephen?
No way.
Why?
Because when Jesus came along and preached and when Stephen came along and preached and
these other men of God preached, did Saul of Tarsus believe they're preaching?
No.
He was against Christianity.
He persecuted Christians.
Look, Saul of Tarsus was on his way to hell, right?
But until Ananias preached him the gospel and he called on the name of the Lord.
Up to that point, he was religious.
He profited in the Jews' religion above many his equals of his own nation.
Why?
Because you could profit in the Jews' religion without being saved.
Saul of Tarsus wasn't saved until he got saved in the book of Acts with Ananias, called
upon the name of the Lord and became the Apostle Paul.
That's who we're talking about, the Apostle Paul.
Before that he was called Saul of Tarsus.
His mentor Gamaliel was unsaved.
Anybody who didn't believe on Christ wasn't saved because the people that were saved,
they were the sheep.
When they heard Christ preaching, they embraced it because they said, "Hey, this is the Word
of God.
We recognize this is the Word of God."
When John the Baptist preached, they recognized it as the Word of God.
When the Apostles preached, they recognized it as the Word of God.
The ones who rejected it and said it was false and heresy, they were just showing that they
weren't even saved in the first place.
So anyway, I just wanted to cover that.
And by the way, with the people who got baptized by John the Baptist, they didn't have to get
baptized again, you know, after the death.