“Of this man’s offspring God has brought to Israel a Savior, Jesus, as he promised.” – Acts 13:23

When things get tough, it feels great when someone helps us out. It could be as simple as a tow truck saving us from being stuck on the side of the road, or as serious as a fire-fighter rescuing us from a bad situation. When life gets hard, we all look for someone to help us.

In Christians, we believe that Jesus is like the ultimate helper, or better put, Savior. This is what Paul’s sermon was about in our text this past Lord’s Day. However, the Bible is replete with descriptions of Jesus as the Savior. This name has a deep meaning in the Bible, representing different things.

Firstly, a savior is like a hero in a battle, saving us from our enemies. In a song in the Bible, David calls the Lord his “savior” because God saved him from dangerous situations in wars.

Salvation in the Bible can also mean getting better from being sick. There’s a story about King Hezekiah who was sick, and when he asked God to make him well, God healed him and even added more years to his life.

And then there’s salvation from doing wrong things, or sin. In a part of the Bible, it talks about a time when God’s people will be saved from their sins and brought back to Him. Forgiveness and becoming good again is another way the Bible talks about salvation.

In the history of a group called the Israelites, God sent many heroes to help them, especially in wars against bad rulers. But with Jesus, it’s like all these ways of being saved come together. He saves us from our mistakes, and when He comes back, He will finally save us from everything bad, like sickness and problems (Matthew 1:21; Revelation 21).

What sort of rescue do we really need? We hope to be freed from tough times and struggles. We wish to be cured of our sicknesses. It’s okay to want these things, but most importantly, we need to be saved from our sins and from God wrath against them. If Jesus is the one who saves us, we can be sure we’ll get this kind of rescue. We can also be excited about the time when He will save us from all our other problems at His second coming.