Season 2: Ep 3 - Just How Big Is Salvation?
In this episode we talk about the comprehensiveness of salvation. Many of us grew up thinking that salvation was only for "me" but it is really much larger. Listen to find out the full extent of God's gracious work.
Podcast Transcript - Just How Big Is Salvation?
As we talked about in our last lesson, salvation is much bigger than most of us inside the Christian church realize, it's quite comprehensive. Not only is God at work with our work too, He is able to set us free and heal us and to make things new. But His Salvation touches all of time.
In Ephesians 2:8 and many of us are familiar with this passage it says, “but you have been saved through faith, this is not of your own doing it's a gift of God not by works.” That's a past salvation. That past salvation we will spend more time talking about later it is what's often referred to in theological terms as justification. That's mentioned in Romans chapter 5:1 it says, “Now that we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” The past has been saved, it has been taken care of, it has been healed. We've been set free from that. We're going to need to unpack that a whole lot more because that has some huge implications into how we live our life.
Salvation doesn't just touch our past, it also touches our present. In I Corinthians 1:18 it says, “For those of you who are being saved” often times we don't think about our “being saved”. That we are being set free and delivered within this moment. That we are being made whole in this moment. Paul in his letter to the Thessalonians, 1st Thessalonians 5:23 uses the theological term here that's being talked about our presentSalvation when he says “Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you entirely.” It's not complete, it's not all done but he's going to save you in this present, he's going to make it more and more full in your life and this is the progressive aspect of salvation. The part of salvation that we live in and through in our day to day.
Not only does salvation touch our past and set us free from all those things back there. Not only is God working good into this very moment, but he also has plans for the future. In Romans 5 just a little bit further after he brought up the concept of justification, in verse nine he says “Much more than having now been justified by his blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son much more having been reconciled, we shall be saved.” This future salvation Paul brings up is probably best in II Corinthians chapter 3 when he says “Now the Lord is a spirit” in verse 17 “And where the Spirit of the Lord is there is liberty, but we all with unveiled face be holding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord are being transformed into the same image, from glory to glory, justice from the Lord the Spirit.” Now I will unpack this a whole lot more in future lessons but the theological term for future salvation is glorification. That somehow our beings as we look into, as we engage with the presence of Christ through the Holy Spirit, our lives begin to tell His story. It begins to just impact not only us but the world around us. It begins to bring us hope that in the end God is going to make everything the way that it's supposed to be. God’s salvation is so comprehensive it touches the past, the present and the future. It touches so much more than we could ever even imagine. Most of the time when we talk about salvation we say “I have been saved, what an incredible thing” and if you have been then it is an incredible thing. But that salvation is so rich, in chapter 5 after he says that we've been justified. In verse 2 “Through whom this Lord Jesus Christ, we have also obtained an introduction by faith into this grace, in which we now stand, and we exalt in the hope of the glory of God. And not only this we know also that our tribulations that those will bring about perseverance. Perseverance proven character, improving character, hope and hope does not disappoint because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit whom He is given to us.”
We can go throughout scripture and I'm just giving us a summary here from chapter 5. Rebirth leads to an emotional experience of peace, hope and love. That leads quickly to healing of our cognitive mind. That we begin to know God's will. That we know what He wants us to do, why He's made us, why he’s called us. It impacts as we talked about before our physical beings, literally people see people walk again.
Finally, it impacts our entire character that we begin to exhibit what's often called the fruit of the spirit. We have love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, self- control. Who doesn't want those things? And those are all the result of God's salvific work. His work to make everything in our past or present in our future all good.
Not only that, He does not want to stop there. If you look in 2 Corinthians chapter 5 Paul says, “He didn't just save you for you, He has made you a minister of reconciliation,” verse 20 “Therefore we are ambassadors for Christ. Although if God was making an appeal to us. We beg you on behalf of Christ be reconciled to God.” This is a good work. God has done this work in certain individuals where He's beginning to work from the inside out. It's beginning to be like the Old Testament salvation, it’s beginning to have physical salvation, that is beginning to have physical impact and as it has physical impact we become new creations. As it says just a few verses before that in 17. As we become these new people, it's not just for me, it's for us and the US’ is who are even outside the Christian faith. That people would see that God can do incredible stuff in us and through us. If that weren't enough Paul in Romans chapter 8 says “God didn't just save you for you, He saved you for us.” And he saved us for even more than that. In verse 18 of chapter 8 he says “For I consider that the suffering of this present time is not worthy to be compared to the glory that's to be revealed to us for the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God, for the creation was subjected to futility not willingly but because of Him who subjected it in hope at the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God.” Paul says this incredible work that God started that He works from the inside out is not just for you not just for us, it is literally for all of creation. For the moon for the stars for the trees for the animals. Everything that God has created He wants to restore and wants to make whole, He wants to fit the whole system back together the way that it was supposed to be.
That should kind of ring true here because if we go all the way back to Genesis chapter 1, God makes His creation and in that kind of pent ultimate moment He creates man and woman. And He says “You're going to watch over my creation. You're going to take care of it, it's going to stay good, it's going to be the best that it could possibly be.” In our rebellion when we choose not to live in God's world taking care of things the way He wants it taken care of the whole thing gets messed up, because of us. If He's going to bring salvation to us it's going to impact all the things that we should have been doing right in the 1st place. This is a great salvation. This is a good work of God.
Because of our kind of western mindset here's the last thing that I want to highlight for us. Colossians chapter 1 and this is going to catch a lot of us off guard because we don't think of the world in this way. As soon as Paul says this, this should make some connection with you, verse 15 of chapter one it says, “He's the image Jesus, is the image of the invisible God, the first born of all creation. For by Him all things were created both in the heavens and on the earth, visible and invisible. Whether thrones, dominions, rulers or authorities.” When God made everything, He literally made everything. It is not just the physical world that has been made by His great plans and by His mighty word. It is because of his plans that literally everything, seen and unseen has been created by Him and for Him.
And this is what's really interesting here in verse 19 you skip a little bit ahead it says “For it was the Father's good pleasure for all the fullness to dwell in Him, in Jesus and through Him to reconcile all things to Himself, having made peace through the blood of His cross through Him I say whether things on earth or things in heaven. Whoa! That should incredibly catch us off guard. Most the time when we talk about salvation, we talk about God going ahead and saving me. In fact one of the most regular verses that is used to be able to talk about God's great salvation is John 3:16 “For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son” and we're taught from very early on, I want you at this moment, I want you to insert your name in there. As personal as God’s salvation is and can be that's not what the text says. The text doesn't say “He came to save Jason.” It says that “He came to save the world” and that word there is literally the word cosmos. This is exactly what Paul is saying and cautions us, He came to save the cosmos, the entire creation, thing seen and unseen. How unbelievable is that? And not only that but He starts with us. The ones who began this rebellion are the same ones he will use to start his restoration. Wow! what a shift of perspective.
God has come to save you and me. Not just save our soul but to save every part of us. As He does that, the impact to save, to heal, to set free the people, the creation and the things around us so large that they touch into the unseen realm. We have no idea to the fullness of. That is a great Salvation. And to that great Salvation, I want to offer you a question, What is Salvation? From what we've seen from the biblical account and it's just grand nature, write down a definition. Write it down so you’ll think about it. We'll talk about that the next time, what is Salvation and what impact does that have on our everyday lives?
