"Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved," and now
let us look what state of mind the gaoler was in. We see, from the
whole narrative, how his eyes had been opened. The earthquake had
done that. Some people need an earthquake before they get their eyes
opened, and it has to be a loud one, too. The gaoler's eyes were
opened, and he made the best use of his time. He was lashing their
backs a little while before! Talk about a change--here was a change.
"Sirs, what must I do to be saved? I am ready to do anything, only
tell me what." And when a soul comes to that state of mind, he has
nothing more to do but to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. And he
came in, trembling, and went down on his knees, and washed their
stripes. When you get to that state of mind, you will soon get saved.
You will have nothing more to do but to believe. You will find it
easy work, then.

II. When is a sinner to believe? When he repents? Here again I am
going to answer some of your letters. One writes: "I am afraid I do
not realize my sin sufficiently. I have no particular agony on
account of sin, but I do see my whole life to have been one huge
error and sin." There is nothing more common than for souls to delude
themselves on this point of feeling. That gentleman confounds feeling
with conviction. He thinks because he has not this extreme agony
which some have, therefore he is not sufficiently convinced, while
the Holy Ghost has opened his eyes to see that his whole life has
been one huge error and sin. He is convinced that it has been
_all_ sin--not one isolated sin here and there abstracted from
his life, but such a perception of his true character that he sees
his whole life to have been sin. Surely, my friend, you are convinced.
What else but the Holy Ghost could have shown you _that_? Now, the truly
repentant soul first sees sin; secondly, he _hates_ sin; thirdly, he