Saved or Lost? [Tract]

Full Text of Saved or Lost?

Some years ago a young man was asked by a friend to go with him to a village where he was going to preach. He agreed to go, not because he was interested in the preaching, but because he thought the trip would be an amusing experience.

Nothing that was said impressed him until the close of the meeting, when his friend urged all who were listening to do one thing before they went to bed that night. He wanted each person to take a piece of paper and, as if they were in God’s presence, to write one word on it, either “SAVED” or “LOST.”

The Moment of Truth

He said that one word or the other describes the condition of everyone in the village and the whole world. The meeting closed and the young man went home, but not to rest. He was very upset, feeling he could not write “SAVED” and quite determined he would not write “LOST.”

For three months the question troubled him. The words “SAVED” and “LOST” followed him everywhere. They seemed to be written before his eyes. He prayed and read the Bible, but no relief came. He was firm in his conviction that he could not honestly write “SAVED” and equally determined that he would not write “LOST.”

One morning he started to read Psalm 23: “The Lord is my Shepherd.” Then he stopped and quietly faced the situation, saying to himself, “I for one cannot say that the Lord is my Shepherd.” Over and over again he read the words. At last he got down on his knees and didn’t get up until he knew that the Lord was his Shepherd, because his Good Shepherd had laid down His life for the sheep whom He had come to seek and to save.

His prized possession is now a piece of paper on which is written: “Saved through faith in our Lord Jesus Christ,” signed by his name and the date when for the first time he could say, “SAVED.” What would you have to write? Have you ever faced the question as to whether you are SAVED or LOST? Listen to what the Scriptures say: “This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners” (1 Timothy 1:15).

Certainty

A Philippian jailer realized he was lost, and he cried to Paul and Silas (two of his prisoners), “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” The answer rang out clear and plain for him and for you and me: “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved” (Acts 16:31). May every reader of these words be able to write “SAVED.” “Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved” (Acts 4:12). “Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved” (Romans 10:13).