The Problems in Personal Evangelism

6. I AM SINCERELY DOING THE BEST THAT I CAN.

1. Sincerity and truth are not identical. Sincerity is sincerity and truth is truth. Sincerity without truth is sincerely wrong.
   
   
   1. If, by accident, we board the wrong bus, will our sincerity and faith in that bus amount to anything? Will it bring us to our destination? So likewise, sincerity without truth is sincerely wrong.
      
      
   2. In life, there are numerous examples of people who were sincerely wrong: hospital patients who sincerely trusted in their physicians and died because of wrong or overdosed medication, or airplane passengers who sincerely placed their faith in the aircraft they were traveling in and never made it to their destinations due to some mishaps. There is nothing great about sincerity if it lacks the truth.
      
      
2. The Jews were sincere in going about to establish their own righteousness, and yet, they were sincerely lost in their sins.
   
   
   1. Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is, that they might be saved. For I bear them record that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge. For they being ignorant of God's righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth. For Moses describeth the righteousness which is of the law, That the man which doeth those things shall live by them. But the righteousness which is of faith speaketh on this wise... That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. -Rom 10:1-9
      
      
   2. What shall we say then? That the Gentiles, which followed not after righteousness, have attained to righteousness, even the righteousness which is of faith. But Israel, which followed after the law of righteousness, hath not attained to the law of righteousness. Wherefore? Because they sought it not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law. For they stumbled at that stumblingstone. - Rom 9:30-32
      
      
3. What saves a soul is not sincerity alone but sincerity coupled with the truth.
   
   
   1. ... Sirs, what must I do to be saved? And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house. - Acts 16:30-31
      
      
   2. And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. -Jn 8:32

Table of Contents
Question 7: I Can Make it to Heaven By My Good Works.