what is salvation?

What is salvation?

One thing it is not is a form of postmortem fire insurance—a get out of jail free card assuring us that because we said a prayer or filled out a card or “gave our lives to Jesus” in some moment of crisis we are hereby and forevermore spared from the fires of hell.

Salvation, according to 1 Corinthians 1:18, is a process. As Paul wrote, “the message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” He does not say “to us who have been saved.” Salvation is not a “one and done” event. It is a process that lasts (at least) a lifetime.

And what does this process entail?

If we are saved not only through Jesus’ death but also by his life (Romans 5:9-10), then the Gospel of Matthew’s summary of Jesus’ earthly ministry is instructive. Twice we are told that Jesus went about “proclaiming the good news of the kingdom [of God] and curing every disease and every sickness among the people” (Matthew 4:23 and 9:35).

Jesus’ proclamation of “good news” was and is a call to become citizens of God’s kingdom—to live as subjects of the crucified king, as servants of the despised and forsaken God who turned the other cheek, absorbing all the hatred, fear, and bitterness that has ever bubbled up from within the human heart.

And to live in this way we must be saved, we must be rescued, we must be delivered not from postmortem condemnation, but from the powers of darkness at work in the kingdoms of this world: from the worship of power, pleasure, profit, and the praise of others; from the demand to prove our worth and justify our existence; from tribalism, from us “vs. them” thinking, from the arrogant belief that my people—my ethnicity, my cultural heritage, my political party—are better than yours. (Hence Paul’s rebuke of the rabidly divided church at Corinth: “How is it that each of you says ‘I belong to Paul,’ or ‘I belong to Apollos,’ or ‘I belong to Cephas,’ or—as the truly self-righteous were saying—‘I belong to Christ’?”)

Whom are you serving? To which kingdom do you belong?

As Matthew’s summary of Jesus’ ministry also implies, salvation involves healing, as well. In some cases, miraculous physical healing. But at a deeper level, the life-giving healing of our souls—healing from disappointments and trauma, from shame and regret, and from the failure to love God and neighbor as we ought.

May God give us the grace to find this healing and to grow into our identity as citizens of God’s kingdom.

(Reflections on RCL Epiphany 3A)