Are you saved? This is a question Christians may ask of those we meet as we attempt to fulfill the great commission given by our Lord Jesus to make known to those whose lives we touch, the gracious gift of salvation He came into the world to provide (1 Timothy 1:15) to all who would acknowledge their desperate need for it and trust Him to provide it. (Romans 10:9-13).
“Salvation” is a big word in terms of what it encompasses in both the dictionary definition and what it represents in the Bible. Salvation – the act of being saved – is defined in the dictionary as the state or experience of being rescued from peril or danger, protected from harm or kept from calamity, loss or ruin – deliverance from destruction. It includes the preservation of something of value or the restoration of something that has been damaged or destroyed.
When the Bible talks of salvation, or our being saved, it is referring first and foremost to being saved from the just judgement of God for our sin, what is referred to as His wrath (Romans 1:18-32), and being restored to the glorious relationship with God for which mankind was created, that was lost because of sin (Isaiah 59:1-4).
Sin, in its clearest definition is our rejection of God’s rule over our lives, displayed in our daily defiance of His righteous laws and commandments. The Bible tells us that sin is the universal condition of the human race, that all have sinned and rejected God’s purpose in creating us (Romans 3:23). Thus all mankind lives under the just judgement and condemnation of a good, righteous and holy God; destined to be cut off forever from the glorious life with God for which we were created, confined at our death to a place which the Bible refers to as Hell, where we will experience forever the fullness of the corruption and misery that sin engenders.
While we are alive in this world, the corruption and misery of sin is mitigated by what I referred to in my previous post as common grace, wherein God graciously provides for us the joys and pleasures and delights of friends and family, marriage and children, food and fun, adventure and entertainment, sunny spring days and much more – none of which we will ever experience again once we die and are consigned to the full measure of his justice and judgment in Hell.
Mankind in our sin corrupted condition can do nothing to escape God’s judgment, to make ourselves acceptable to a Holy God, to make up for the innumerable crimes we have committed against Him nor to restore ourselves to the moral perfection necessary to live in His glorious presence (Psalm 24:3-5).
The Bible is clear that our salvation is not dependent upon the will of man, the works of man, or the worth of man – but “Salvation is of the Lord.”
Titus 3:3-7 4 But when the kindness and the love of God our Savior toward man appeared, 5 not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, 6 whom He poured out on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior, 7 that having been justified (declared not guilty of our sin), by His grace we should become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.
Theologian J.I. Packard writes the following regarding God’s saving grace in his wonderful book, Knowing God; “The grace of God is His love freely shown toward guilty sinners, contrary to their merit, and indeed in defiance of their demerit. It is God showing goodness to persons who deserve only severity, and have no reason to expect anything but severity (justice/judgment and wrath of God which has its full expression in hell) … it (the gospel) tells how our Judge has become our Savior … Grace and salvation belong together as cause and effect.”
Jesus did not come into this world for the purpose of revealing Himself as some great religious leader or moral example, nor as some great profit or teacher, nor to become a societal reformer or ideological martyr. He came to “save His people from their sins” (Matthew 1:21), accomplishing everything necessary to rescue those who entrust their life to Him from the Hell they deserve, and qualifying them for a Heaven no sinful man or women could ever earn or deserve.
Jesus is our one and only Savior – the sole means by which we can be saved from the eternal wrath of God and made heirs – the glad recipients of the eternal grace of God. And if you have not already done so, I would encourage you to entrust your life – your future – your eternal destiny to Jesus today.
Grace and Peace ×