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October 12, 2026 |
| How Salvation Works | ||
Facebook chose to show me this post that reminded me of a common problem in the church. Most don't understand some of the foundational ideas in Christianity. In this case, not understanding how salvation works results in a person coming up with an argument against standard dogma. This person is then able to convince others that he is correct because they don't understand salvation any better than he does.
The Bible makes it clear enough that Jesus died for the sins of every person, and most churches accept that. This person's post is presented as a scholarly defense of the idea that Jesus didn't die for the sins of every person, but only for the sins of the elect.
Now, you might think, "Who cares? The outcome is that the same people receive salvation either way." Calvinists care; they care very much because they believe that God saves only the ones he chooses to save. People have no say in the matter. If a Calvinist can show that Jesus died only for the elect, then it supports the idea that a person has no role in salvation. Calvinists also believe that once a person is saved, he cannot lose his salvation.
To say that a person has salvation means that he is saved from something. But saved from what? He is saved from the consequences of his sins, which would be eternal torment.
The determination of who receives eternal torment comes on judgment day, which is still at least 1,000 years in the future. Therefore salvation is either skipping that judgment or being found innocent. Therefore salvation applies only at that time.
It doesn't make any sense for a person to say, "I am saved," because he does not know his own future. Salvation is not a badge you can wear. The only way a person can say "I am saved" is if it is understood that he means that he will be saved as long as he continues to believe in Jesus.
When we sin, we cause two things. We make ourselves unacceptable to God (separation), and we offend God (injury). To be a person who will be saved, these two things must be fixed, which requires two things: God's forgiveness, which heals the separation, and atonement, which heals the injury.
Our problem comes when we understand that everything we have belongs to God, leaving us with nothing we can sacrifice that will cover the injury we created.
Forgiveness is so easy, for those who are able to believe, that we can easily forget it is a necessary part, as the author of the post does.
It's easier to see these two parts in the Old Covenant, where the Bible clearly says that a man is made righteous by faith. We also see the temple sacrifices for atonement. Faith was not enough.
But those sacrifices of animals could only atone for unintentional sins. Therefore salvation was not possible through them. Thus they showed that the system of salvation was incomplete. Something was missing; something whose death would be great enough that it could atone for all sins.
We cannot choose to believe in Jesus, though many people who claim to be Christians say they have done that. God must lead us to the point where we are able to believe. At that time, he gives us the faith necessary to believe.
Can we lose our salvation? No, we can't, because we don't have salvation. Remember I said that it isn't a thing we can possess. It is something that will be done for us at a future time. At that time, we will be saved from the consequences of our sins. That is the hope that we have through faith in Jesus.
Can we lose our hope of salvation? Yes, we definitely can. We do this by sinning intentionally. By saying, "I know God said not to do this, but I'm doing it anyway," we lose faith in God (and Jesus). We no longer trust that his words are true. This leaves us separated from him, and his atonement is no longer available to us.
Without thinking of it in that way, we have treated his death on the cross as no different than any other person's death. We have become one of the people who put him on the cross, not one who trusted in him, and are no longer righteous before him.
It's a technicality, but the sins that we sinned before becoming a Christian and any unintentional sins committed while a Christian are still covered. We have become a new man, and already have our first sin, and are without any way to atone for it. We have also lost credit for any good works that we did while a Christian.
We can easily be restored by repentance, just as a person who has never believed can do. This repentance covers over all previous sins, making us new men, without any sins, but also without any good works. It is better to enter into eternal life as a naked baby than to enter into eternal torment.
Due to poor teaching in Churchianity, a person may not realize that his intentional sin has separated him from God and he is no longer a Christian. He may continue to believe that salvation will be his.
The church contains many such people. Some have lost their hope of salvation, but don't know it; some of them never believed, but still expect salvation and eternal life.
The Catholic Church says that Christians have to do things to maintain their salvation (hope of salvation). They are wrong.
But we do need to maintain our hope of salvation because we sin unintentionally because we are human and imperfect. When we recognize that we have done this, Jesus applies his sacrifice to cover the sin. We didn't give up our faith in him, so all that is needed is to atone for the sin.