Post details: Theological Myth - Salvation is getting forgiven of your sins.

12/12/05

Permalink 10:52:53 am, Categories: GraceHead teaching, By Trent
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Theological Myth - Salvation is getting forgiven of your sins.

Salvation is not a clean / dirty issue.
Salvation is a life / death issue.

Salvation has nothing to do with getting forgiven. Salvation has everything to do with being raised to life from your current death by the Holy Spirit.

1 John 2
2He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world.

The entire world is already reconciled. Nobody is in need of being cleaned up so that they can approach God. However, not all of the world is alive. Not everyone has real life in them.

Romans 11:15
For if their rejection is the reconciliation of the world, what will their acceptance be but life from the dead?

Contrary to popular opinion, the death of Jesus has only a preparitory roll in salvation. Salvation is not by His death, but by His life!

Romans 5:10
For if, when we were God's enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life!

We just need to get the word out that no matter what you have done, you are reconciled! You can approach God based on the finished work of Christ and receive salvation through new birth. All that any of us lack when we enter the world is the moment in time when we reluctantly or enthusiastically come to God and ask Him to make us new, to come inside and give us new life!

2 Corinthians 5:19
that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men's sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation.

"NOT COUNTING MEN'S SINS AGAINST THEM."

All that is missing is salvation by the second birth - infusion of the Spirit / Being of God within man.

John 3
3In reply Jesus declared, "I tell you the truth, no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again. ... 6Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. 7You should not be surprised at my saying, 'You must be born again.'

John 5
24"I tell you the truth, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life. 25I tell you the truth, a time is coming and has now come when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God and those who hear will live. 26For as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son to have life in himself"

John 6:53
Jesus said to them, "I tell you the truth, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you."

Drink and eat the substance of the One that has Life, and it will become the spiritual substance of your innermost being, just as the physical food becomes the substance of your physical body.


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Comments:

Comment from: Herobill [Visitor] · http://herobill.blogspot.com

Hey, Trent.  I think I see your point and purpose here.  What do you think about this:

I think salvation is the forgiveness of sins.  It's being raised from sin and death.  It's also being plunged into Christ, and having Christ begin to dwell within you.  Salvation is the moment when one who was fallen becomes a new creature, a spiritual creature, a member of the new race of men-in-Christ.

Salvation means being saved.

AND I think salvation is just the onramp after the detour. 

The Highway is Life.

Permalink 12/14/05 @ 16:12
Comment from: Trent [Member] · http://www.GraceHead.com
Bill,

You are on track ... Or at least we are on the same track. :-)
Most church-goers seem to think that salvation is getting forgiven, and that is the extent of it.
"God forgives people so that they get to go to heaven even though He would otherwise be really mad that they sinned."
I would estimate that at least 8 out of 10 church-goers would say something similar, wouldn't you?

I look at getting forgiven as just an appetizer. Reconciliation doesn't really feed anybody's hungry soul. One can be forgiven and reconciled but not really saved. Even our famous John 3:16 shows that it isn't a clean and dirty issue, but a life and death issue.

If we have died of cancer and someone finds the cure, what good is it to us? Sure, they could administer the cure to us, but what good is that to a corpse?
Our cancer is sin and the wage of sin is death. So what good is it if someone comes along and rids us of what killed us? Are we not still dead?

Provided that we have died of cancer and someone finds a way to revive us, but has no cure for cancer, then why even bother reviving us? Take a dead cancer victim and give them life, while they still have cancer, and they will shortly die again. Perhaps immediately die again.
Our being transferred from death to life, does not come without the cure for what killed us to begin with. In fact our remedy is really two fold. Thus it is written:
Romans 5:10
"For if, when we were God's enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life!"

I am putting the emphasis on the part of the equation that scripture emphasizes - salvation by His Life!

Ripening for the harvest,
Trent
www.GraceHead.com
Permalink 12/21/05 @ 10:24
Comment from: Chris Turner [Visitor] · http://godblog.com
Trent, you said:

Most church-goers seem to think that salvation is getting forgiven, and that is the extent of it.
"God forgives people so that they get to go to heaven even though He would otherwise be really mad that they sinned."
I would estimate that at least 8 out of 10 church-goers would say something similar, wouldn't you?


Our pastor, Tim (of whom Trent knows), and the rest of the ministerial staff, are fond of saying something similar: most people view salvation as fire insurance, and beyond that, they do not allow God's Spirit to change them. (I cannot tell you how many times I've heard the cancer reference this year.)

Something we did in TEAM Training last month brought home to me how much God's Spirit has changed me. We wrote up our testimonies, then broke in to small groups and shared them. I asked Christ to be my Lord when I was 15. I was (am?) one of those really smart kids that everyone picked on; nothing physical, but a lot of teasing and the like that left me shy and nonconfrontational. One proof that I was changed through my relationship was Jesus was my taking on the administration of our high school to get our Bible club recognized as an official club. This was something I never would have done before my conversion.

God's Spirit is still changing me, and thank God for that!

chris
Permalink 12/21/05 @ 10:40
Comment from: Yoshi [Visitor]
Hi. It's me, Yoshi (not my real name, but I don't want to show it very publically), but I have something to say:

So salvation is by being one with the Holy Spirit and not by getting your sins forgiven since it's already been forgiven?
Permalink 01/09/11 @ 23:14
Comment from: Trent [Member] · http://www.GraceHead.com
Yoshi,
You summarized the point of this article well.
Read the verses again and let them speak to you.

Indeed the whole world is reconciled to God through the death of Christ.
Yet only those who ask and receive will be saved by His life.
... for this is the revelation of scripture from the front cover to the back cover.

Amen.
Permalink 01/09/11 @ 23:28

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