"What must I do to be lost forever?" What a startling question! Reader, did you ever seriously consider it? How surprising that there should be any difference of judgment about it! Yet there is. And why? Because people do not listen to what God has to say. They take their own thoughts and venture to have an opinion of their own, forgetting that God says: "My thoughts are not your thoughts." Isa. 55:88For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord. (Isaiah 55:8). Our only safety, then, is in accepting what God says in His Word.
We shall see from Scripture that there is only one thing to do to insure being lost forever. It is a very simple, but a very solemn and dreadful thing.
On the other hand, you may be temperate and moral, truthful, honest and religious; you may be a regular attendant at your place of worship; pay your pew rent; subscribe liberally to charitable institutions; even take the sacrament, and yet be doing that one thing, which, if persisted in, will land you (and God knows how soon!) on the hopeless side of hell's fixed gulf—an eternally lost soul!
Some people think you must commit very glaring sins to be lost forever. Others think it is not the kind of sins but the number, and that you must commit a great number of sins to be lost forever. Scripture says, "How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation?" You need only to continue living a life of carelessness and indifference, neglecting (not your duties, but) this great salvation. And how can you escape? Can heaven, earth, or hell answer that question? No, my reader, no! There is an eternal silence as to it. And why? Because there is no escape.
God heralds forth in this sad, sin-blighted world salvation by Jesus Christ. He speaks of a salvation which His grace brings for all men (Titus 2:1111For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, (Titus 2:11)): a salvation which brings no conditions, and makes no demands as a ground for receiving it, and based on the death and blood-shedding of the Lord Jesus Christ. It is suitable for man in all his deep and desperate need. Then, to be lost forever, simply close your ear to this glorious gospel, and thus neglect this great salvation. You may do anything, be anything, say anything; only continue to neglect this great salvation and your doom is certain.
Now let us look at the other side: "What must I do to be saved?" Mark the simplicity of the answer: "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved." Acts 16:3131And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house. (Acts 16:31).
Nothing is said about uprightness of character and attendance on the means of grace, or any such things. No! The object of faith is a Person, not yourself, nor your works. It is the Lord Jesus Christ. God pledges salvation to the person who believes on His Son: so that the moment you believe on Him, you may know that you are saved. So simple for faith, but so marvelously efficacious for eternity.