A Theology of Salvation: Part 1

This project is in response to a request from a good friend in the Zeandale Community church who desires to have a better understanding of the concept of salvation.

Salvation is represented by numerous biblical images which depict what God has done, is presently doing, and what he will do on behalf of humanity. This is in response to the suffering brought on by misery (physical and mental), mortality (the fact that we are all going to die regardless of how long we live), and meaninglessness of the human condition. Salvation refers to the process and the results.

 

Salvation History

The Bible can be seen as one very large, but very basic story. Components of the story are:

• Human beings made in the image of God have complicated their relationship with God due to sin.
  
• Christ the central character
  
• Salvation the plot throughout the book
  

The process or plot goes like this:

• The initial condition in the Garden of Eden
  
• That situation is disturbed by the entrance of sin into the world (the Fall)
  
• The consequences
  
  • Sin entered the world
    
  • Death entered the world
    
  • Human beings became separated from
    
    • God
      
    • Each other
      
    • Nature
      
    • Husband from wife
      
• The process of overcoming the consequences culminating in the cross of Jesus
  
• The resolution of the problem through the resurrection and the Day of Pentecost
  

 

Prior to this time the whole matter was a mystery as to exactly how God intended to save the ungodly. Jesus refers to the "mystery of the kingdom" when he teaches with parables. The disciples get the picture head on, but the crowds have to deal with it in a roundabout sort of way because they are not mentally or spiritually prepared to handle the meat of the message. (Mark 4:11-12). Paul puts it this way in Ephesians 1:3-14. Let's walk through this passage as it is a very powerful one in regard to our salvation.

• EPH 1:3 ¶ Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ,
  
  • We learn here that God is the author of our salvation
    
  • That salvation includes every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ. The "heavenly places" refers to the spiritual realm. We live in two worlds all at the same time. One we can easily see because it is the physical world and can be scientifically studied and analyzed. But the other world is the spiritual world. It is where angels and demons, God, Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit, and Satan operate. Most Westerners pay little attention to this aspect of life. Instead we are hung up in the physical world. But God wants to bless us in the spiritual realm. Thus we need to be in tune with that realm. Our door to that world is prayer and the recognition of what the Holy Spirit is prompting us to do.
    
• EPH 1:4 just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him. This verse is often used to prove that predestination is the way God deals with humanity. Predestination says that God has predetermined the eternal fate of everyone. Some even go so far to say that God has even predestined our earthly lives and our goal in life is to discover what God has in mind for us. If we fail to do what God planned for us we will be miserable until we discover what he really intended. Of course, it is not always easy to find that path and some people struggle with God their entire lives trying to figure out what he "really" wanted them to do. The first stage of God's plan is for us to be holy and blameless before him. That desire is not limited to a select "elect" group in the world, but rather to all of humanity.
  
  • Included by some in this concept is the idea that God has planned whom we should marry. In the event we make a mistake the first time, it is legitimate to divorce and remarry the right mate.
    

 

• In love EPH 1:5 He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will, we have an odd break between verses 5 and 6. The real sense is given in the way I have divided the verse. In verse 5 we discover the message of predestination. That predestination is to be adopted as sons by God through Jesus Christ and does not speak of some limited atonement. The issue as to whether or not someone is saved is called of God or not. All are called. The issue is the response.
  
• EPH 1:6 to the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. A major part of God's plan is grace, which is a gift that we cannot earn which he has given us through the Beloved, Jesus Christ.
  
• EPH 1:7 In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to
  the riches of His grace,
  
  • Redemption, which is the idea we have been purchased back from something, in this case from the price of sin which we committed
    
  • Forgiveness for our trespasses, trespasses referring to things we have deliberately done wrong.
    
• EPH 1:8-10 which He lavished upon us. In all wisdom and insight He made known to us the mystery of His will, according to His kind intention which He purposed in Him with a view to an administration suitable to the fullness of the times, that is, the summing up of all things in Christ, things in the heavens and things upon the earth.
  
• In Him EPH 1:11-12 also we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to His purpose who works all things after the counsel of His will, to the end that we who were the first to hope in Christ should be to the praise of His glory. The question needs to be raised as to what is meant by the counsel of His will. Some would suggest that God has a perfect plan for every person and will quote Jeremiah 29:11 in this regard. When you read the context of Jeremiah 29:11 you discover that Jeremiah is talking about those who are about those who have gone into the Babylonian Captivity in 597 BC. Therefore, if Jeremiah 29:11 applies to us today, then we must be experiencing exile.
  
  • How do we know the counsel of God's will? Some wait for some sort of providential guidance that will give them the direction that they need. But the real answer is that we know the will of God, first of all, by reading his revelation—the Bible. God or the Holy Spirit is not going to direct us to contradict the word of God. Some might say that the Bible is not specific enough, so we have to wait on the Spirit of God to tell exactly what to do. The Bible operates on broad principles that we must follow. The exact details of how we do that is left up to us. God also expects to interact with him through prayer and finally to listen to wise counselors about the decisions we need to make. When we do that we are following the will of God.
    
• EPH 1:13-14 In Him, you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation-- having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, with a view to the redemption of God's own possession, to the praise of His glory. After we have heard the message of truth, which was the Gospel of our salvation, we believed and as a result, were sealed with the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is a pledge. This word refers to a token or down payment that guarantees that the full amount is guaranteed to be forthcoming. We have not experienced the fullness of salvation, but the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives gives us a foretaste of what is to come.
  

  
   

The logic and scope of salvation

• God's dealings with the children of Abraham in the beginning
  
• In the middle the focus turns to Jesus and his followers
  
• The end of the story, which we are still in, embraces the Gentiles and the whole created order.
  

 

The first hint of salvation is found when Eve is confronted by God in regard to her act of sin. God condemned the Serpent for his part in the project, the promise is made in Genesis 2:15, "And the seed of the woman will bruise the head of the seed of the serpent." If this were all we had on the matter, then we would not really be sure what is involved. But God often uses progressive revelation whereby he shows a small part of the big picture, and then expands thereon. The key phrase in this passage is "the seed of the woman." This could be translated "the offspring of the woman," but by keeping the word "seed" we remain closer to the original intent of the writer. Besides the Bible never uses the phrase, "seed of the woman", anywhere else. The "seed" belongs to the man, not the woman.

 

In Genesis 3:15 we also have the phrase "and he shall bruise your heel." This alludes to the cost of salvation, the cross and the death of Christ.

 

In this case God waits several thousand years until the time of the Prophet Isaiah. In response to a challenge from the wicked, worthless Ahaz, God makes this declaration, "Behold a virgin shall conceive and shall bring forth a son, and you shall call his name Immanuel, which means, 'God with us.'" (Isaiah 7:14). The picture has been made significantly clearer, but the word "virgin" in Hebrew could be translated "young woman" (of marriageable age). It is noteworthy that where this word is used in the Hebrew Bible it clearly refers to a virgin. The passage could refer to a young woman who has recently been married and this is her first child.

 

Thus, it is not until the New Testament that we learn the real intent of Genesis 3:15. When Jesus is born of a virgin, Matthew tells us that this is in fulfillment of the passage we previously quoted in Isaiah 7:14. Jesus did not have an earthly father; thus his earthly seed was that of a woman, the only time that such an event takes place in all of history.

 

• Salvation is accomplished by Jesus Christ
  
• Salvation is celebrated in the life of the church
  
• Salvation comes to an end with the return of Jesus and the end of the world
  

 

Israel and Salvation

• Deliverance from captivity and oppression
  
• Crossing the Red Sea, symbolic of baptism
  

 

The Second Exodus

• Jesus' death or "exodus" from this life
  
• A new deliverance
  
  • Release from the bondage of sin by the death of Jesus