The Need

“Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels’” (Matt 25:41).

Fallen humans are, without God’s help, in a very precarious state, literally a heartbeat away from hell — the punishment created for the treasonous angels whose rebellion we joined. But that knowledge does not really explain the sinner’s condition, so to begin our look at the doctrine of salvation, let’s examine five pictures the scriptures use to describe the unsaved person.

Lost: “Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Doesn’t he leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it?” (Luke 15:4).

Jesus talked about lost coins and lost sons, but most often he talked about lost sheep. Unlike a lost coin, a lost sheep hasn’t been misplaced; it has wandered off. We are like that sheep. When you get lost, you’re lost before you realize that you’re lost. And when you’re lost, you pretty much stay lost until something outside of you changes that — be it a street sign or a helpful stranger.

Like lost sheep, humans have wandered away from God, many not even realizing they are lost, not realizing the danger they are now in, and we have no hope unless someone comes to find us.

Sick: “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick” (Matt 9:12).

“Sin is the sickness of the soul; sinners are spiritually sick.”¹ Like being lost, people can be sick without knowing it; generally it seems the worse the disease, the more likely you are to be unaware until it’s serious. And when you are sick with a serious disease, you must have a doctor. This is not going to get better on its own; you need help. Sin is just such a disease. Those who realize they are sick go to the doctor. Those who realize they are poor in spirit turn to the Savior.

Slave: “I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin” (John 8:34).

“All humanity serves under one of two slaveries—either ‘sin, which leads to death’ or ‘obedience, which leads to righteousness.’ [Rom 6:16] There is no middle ground.”² In our natural state, humans are not free. Sins owns us, and we obey our master. There is no escape from this slavery, nor is there any way to free yourself. The only hope is that someone would come and redeem us.

Dead: “As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins” (Eph 2:1).

Once mankind joined the rebellious angels, their judgment fell on us, so “whoever does not believe stands condemned already” (John 3:18). We are spiritually already dead. “The human predicament is absolute; there is no escape. There is no way for people already condemned to avoid condemnation. Only from the outside can any effective solution come.”³ The dead have no hope except in the one who can raise the dead.

Child: “In the same way we also, when we were children, were enslaved to the elementary principles of the world” (Gal 4:3).

Paul uses the picture of a wealthy child who is nevertheless under the control of guardians. This child might as well be a slave for all the control he has over his affairs. In the same way, the “elementary principles of this world” have absolute control over the unsaved person. “For an unbeliever there is potential salvation and fulfillment of the promise given to all the world through Abraham (Gen. 12:3). But unless and until he spiritually ‘comes of age’ through saving trust in Jesus Christ, every unbeliever is a kind of slave and is imprisoned under the elemental things of the world.”⁴

Whatever metaphor the scriptures use, the picture is the same. People in their natural state are powerless, helpless, hopeless. The whole human race was on a path to that eternal fire. “But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons” (Gal 4:4-5). So now we will turn to how that redemption was accomplished and what that adoption entails.


1 Matthew Henry’s Commentary on the Whole Bible on Matt 9:12
2 R Kent Hughes, Romans — Righteousness from Heaven
3 Walter Elwell ed, Evangelical Commentary on the Bible on Eph 2:1
4 John MacArthur, Galatians: The MacArthur New Testament Commentary

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