1. My message this morning is entitled, "The Most Important Question in the World" (Acts 16:30).
2. In my opinion, the Philippian jailer asked the most important question in the world" (Acts 16:30).
3. Some might disagree with me and say that Pontius Pilate asked the most important question.  Pilate's words are recorded in Matthew 27:22, "What shall I do then with Jesus which is called Christ?"
4. Both these questions are very important and somewhat similar. 
5. Paul and Silas were in jail in Philippi for casting a devil out of a young woman (Acts 16:16-24).
6. While in prison, "Paul and Silas prayed, and sang praises unto God: and the prisoners heard them" (Acts 16:25).
7. When they prayed, God miraculously intervened and sent an earthquake which shook the foundations of the prison (16:25, 26).
8. The jailor was responsible for all the prisoners, and according to Roman law if he lost any of them, he lost his life (cf. Acts 12:19).
9. That is why this Philippian jailor was preparing to kill himself (16:27). He would have preferred suicide to a cruel Roman execution.
10. Paul and Silas probably persuaded the other prisoners to stay – "we are all here" (16:28).  This brings us to the most important question in the world (16:29, 30).

I. THE JAILER'S QUESTION (ACTS 16:30).

1. This is a wonderful question.  It is an excellent question.
2. And he was given a wonderful and excellent answer (16:31).
3. If the Philippian jailer were alive today, and if he were to ask this question today, he would get a variety of answers, but the only correct answer is found here in Acts 16:31.
4. Acts 4:12 says, "Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved."
5. Romans 10:9 says, "That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved."
6. John 3:16 says, "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life."
7. The answer to this question is found all throughout the Bible. 
8. But if that jailer were to ask that same question to some so-called Christian ministers today, he would not get the correct answer.
9. If that jailer were to ask a Seventh Day Adventist, he would be told something vastly different from the answer given by Paul and Silas.
10. Francis D. Nichol wrote a book entitled,
                   Answers to Objections,
                   A Major examination of the objections raised against
                   the teachings of Seventh day Adventists.
11. This is an official SDA book, and it is published by their publishing house.  In this book Mr. Nichol said "claiming full and final salvation" is a "false doctrine."
12. It sounds to me like the apostle Paul was claiming full and final salvation" (Acts 16:30; cf. II Tim. 1:8, 9; Eph. 2:8, 9).
13. Ellen G. White is considered an inspired "prophetess" by the Seventh-Day Adventists.  Mr. Nichol quotes her often in his book. She said, "Those who accept the Saviour, however sincere their conversion, should never be taught to say or to feel that they are saved.  This is misleading" (quoted in an official SDA book, Answers to Objections, by Francis D. Nichol, published by the Review and Herald Publishing Association, Washington, D.C., p. 402).
14. Well, it is unwise to ask a Seventh-Day Adventist how to be saved.  What if the jailer were to ask a Jehovah's Witness (Acts 16:30)?
15. To a JW, salvation requires that one accept their unique interpretation of Scripture, be baptized as a Jehovah's Witness, and then follow their program of works as laid out by their "governing body" (this program involves selling Watchtower magazines, etc.).
16. It is not a good idea to ask a JW how to be saved. What if the jailer were to ask a Roman Catholic priest? 
17. The priest would talk about sacraments, and Mary, and the saints, and the pope, and purgatory, and so on. 
18. The simplicity of the Gospel is obscured by all of their sacraments and traditions.  It is a waste of time to ask a priest how to be saved.  If that Philippian jailer were to follow the teachings of the RCC he would die and go to hell.

II. THE JAILER'S CONVERSION.

1. The book of Acts is a book of exciting conversions -- the Ethiopian eunuch, Saul of Tarsus, Cornelius, Lydia, and many others.
2. And here in Acts 16:30-34 we see the wonderful conversion of the Philippian jailer.
3. Many years ago, the great evangelist D.L. Moody was holding a series of evangelistic meetings in St. Louis. One night he preached from the same text I am preaching this morning.
4. The following day the local paper reported the sermon (a common practice back in those days) under the sensational headline: "How the Jailor at Philippi Was Caught."
5. A notorious criminal named Valentine Burke happened to pick up the paper in the city prison. He had already spent half his life in jail and was at this time awaiting trial for another crime that he had committed.
6. Glancing at the headlines, he did not realize that it was about a sermon preached by D.L. Moody. He had once passed through a small town in Illinois named Philippi, and so he assumed that this was what the story was about.
7. However, as he read the story he kept seeing the words: "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved." He threw the newspaper down and walked away.
8. But though he threw the newspaper down, he was already under conviction. He picked up the paper and read the sermon carefully. Alone in his jail cell, he got on his knees and prayed. And God miraculously saved him.
9. A hardened sinner was transformed into a humble Christian by the grace of God.  Valentine Burke served a reduced sentence due to his Christian conduct and was later offered a position as deputy by the same sheriff who had once arrested him.
10. Valentine Burke was genuinely saved. How about you?   Are you saved?
11. Evangelist RA Torrey was a good friend and co-laborer of DL Moody. One day he received a letter from a man who said it was a very hard thing to expect people to stand up to confess Christ in the way Torrey asked them to.
12. By the way, pressing for a response to the Gospel, and giving a public invitation did not start with DL Moody or RA Torrey or Charles Finney or any other great evangelist.  It is in the Bible.
13. Jesus said, "Whosoever therefore shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father which is in heaven. But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in heaven" (Matthew 10:32, 33).
14. Joshua said, "Choose you this day whom ye will serve" (Josh. 24:15).
15. Elijah said, "How long halt ye between two opinions? if the LORD be God, follow him: but if Baal, then follow him" (I Kings 18:21).
16. Peter said, "Save yourselves from this untoward generation" (Acts 2:40).
17. But this man said it was a very hard thing to expect people to stand up to confess Christ in the way Torrey asked them to.  And he went on to tell Dr. Torrey an easier way to get conversions.
18. RA Torrey read the man's letter at one of his meetings, and said this, "But I am not looking for an easier way. I abominate these easy ways. I believe in getting people converted. I could pass around cards and get them to sign their names, saying that they hoped to go to heaven; but a month after I had gone the effect would be nothing, or worse than nothing. I do not take any stock in any faith that does not lead to an open confession of Christ before the world, and I do not take any stock in the Christianity of your professed Christians unless it leads you to go out into the world and witness for the One who saved you."
19. RA Torrey wrote those words 100 years ago, and today people are still looking for the "easy way."   We need to do things the Bible way.

III. THE JAILER'S BAPTISM (16:33).

1. The Philippian jailer took Paul and Silas and washed their stripes (16:33).  This is evidence of his conversion.
2. The Philippian jailer was genuinely saved.  He heard the Gospel and believed the Gospel.  Then he was baptized (Acts 16:30-34).
3. Apparently his entire household was saved and baptized (16:33, 34).
4. Furthermore, they were baptized right away.  "Straightway" (16:33) means "immediately, instantly."
5. This is the New Testament pattern (cf. Acts 8:35-39; 9:17, 18; 10:47, 48; 16:14, 15).
6. Our English word "baptize" comes from the Greek word baptizo, which literally means "to dip, to immerse, to submerge."
7. In the Bible, baptism always follows conversion, and it is always by immersion (cf. Acts 8:36-39).
8. John the Baptist baptized his converts "in Aenon near to Salim, because there was much water there" (John 3:23).
9. We need to put the right emphasis on believer's baptism.  However, the greater emphasis must be placed on preaching the Gospel because that is what saves souls.
10. That is how the Philippian jailer got saved.
11. That is how his family got saved (Acts 16:33, 34).  The New Testament teaches: first conversion, then baptism.
12. Jesus said in Mark 16:15, 16, "Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.  He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned."
13. Baptism is part of the Great Commission, but people are saved by believing the Gospel.   People are damned for not believing the Gospel.
14. Paul said in I Corinthians 1:17, "For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel."
15. Paul was not denigrating or belittling baptism.  He was stressing the importance of the Gospel.
16. In I Timothy 1:11, Paul calls it "the glorious gospel of the blessed God, which was committed to my trust."

CONCLUSION:

1. Charles Haddon Spurgeon, as a young man, went into a Primitive Methodist church during a heavy winter snowstorm. He was on his way to own church but he could not make it.  So he turned aside into that tiny, little Primitive Methodist church—what they call a chapel in Great Britain.
2. The pastor was not there because the weather was so bad.  And Spurgeon walked in and sat down.  I hear that there is a great big bronze plaque in that Methodist chapel, pointing out where Spurgeon sat that day.
3. The preacher who was filing in for the pastor was rather unlearned and uneducated.  He preached Isaiah 45:22: “Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth.” 
4. He preached with great fervor, and he pointed to the young visitor and said to him, "Young man, you look so miserable.  Look to Jesus.  Look to Jesus." 
5. And he shouted it with all of his voice.  “Look to Jesus!”  And Spurgeon said, "That day I looked and I lived."
6. And that is how Spurgeon was gloriously saved.